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Harry Nelson interviewed on Yahoo Entertainment: Coronavirus shutdowns: Kid Rock’s Nashville bar to remain open despite mayor’s order Founding Partner Harry Nelson was interviewed on Yahoo! Entertainment to discuss the several bars in Nashville, TN that refuse to close, despite a mandate the local mayor. JUST IN: Several bars on Lower Broadway, including popular Tootsies, Honky Tonk Central, Kid Rock’s bar, will remain OPEN after Nashville mayor asked them to close over #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/LfGJ1ZfzoU — FoxNashville (@FOXNashville) March 15, 2020 Kid Rock’s Big Ass Honky Tonk Rock N’ Roll Steakhouse in Nashville won’t be shutting down despite a mandate from the mayor. Mayor John Cooper ordered bars throughout Davidson County, Tennessee, to close in an effort to stop the spread of the coronavirus, but Steve Smith — who co-owns the bar — said he won’t comply. … Kid Rock has yet to publicly weigh in. Yahoo Entertainment reached out to a representative for the rocker but did not immediately receive a response. Harry Nelson, founder and managing partner of Nelson Hardiman, Los Angeles’ largest health care law firm, called their decision “dead wrong.” “Tennessee law empowers Nashville’s Metropolitan Board of Health to impose emergency public health measures,” Nelson told Yahoo Entertainment. “Nashville Mayor John Cooper is lawfully issuing directives based on the Chief Medical Director’s recommendation. [The owners] may not like their decisions, but these are the designated officials empowered to make difficult decisions like this in a crisis. These closures are constitutional.” Nelson stressed, “lives are at stake.” “More people will die in a rapid spread of COVID-19 fueled by transmission at gathering places because our hospitals will be overwhelmed,” he added. “There already aren’t enough ventilators for all of the people whose lives will depend on them. Kid Rock himself may be healthy, but other people who need care will pay a price for [the] decision.” Smith said he’s awaiting a statewide mandate, which Nelson further explained. “In our federal system, the state has sovereignty alongside the federal government and regulates the public health. Local city and county officials derive their power from state laws, regulations and authorization. In other words, mayors and local boards of health only have as much power as the state says they have,” Nelson shared. “The state has absolute authority to close down businesses, order people to stay home and decide what the consequences are for people who violate these laws. The state already criminalizes defiant behavior and can further authorize local law enforcement and prosecutors to arrest and charge people like Kid Rock with crimes.” If a statewide mandate comes down and Kid Rock’s Big Ass Honky Tonk Rock N’ Roll Steakhouse remains open, they will likely face repercussions. “Currently, most law on the books limit the punishments to criminal misdemeanors with limited fines for people who disregard public health official orders and create the risk of spreading infection,” Nelson said, explaining in Tennessee, that can be 30 days in jail and fines of $50. “But in the HIV context, Tennessee made it a felony, with up to 15 years and a $10,000 fine to expose another person to HIV,” he noted. “We may see state governments passing laws to raise the stakes” around the coronavirus. Original Article Harry Nelson on Fox News: COVID-19 Outbreak could ‘backlog’ Lori Loughlin case, delaying trial, says legal expert Founding Partner Harry Nelson was interviewed on Fox News concerning the backlog of trial cases due to the Coronavirus pandemic. From the interview: “Coronavirus has thrown our judicial system for a loop. Court clerks, lawyers and jurors are freaking out yet no one seems to have the power to order and manage a closure,” Harry Nelson, managing partner of Los Angeles-based healthcare law firm Nelson Hardiman, told Fox News on Friday. The co-author of “From ObamaCare to TrumpCare: Why You Should Care” said courts throughout the country “should have been closed a few days ago” and, that with so many moving pieces in the bureaucratic chain of command, there is no designated decision-maker to levy the verdict of closing the courts. “Shutting down the courts is complicated because the courts are so decentralized,” he explained. “Each judge is typically sovereign [in] his or her own courtroom, with limited oversight. So there’s no one with their finger on the trigger to make a quick decision.” Nelson said many folks involved in regular court proceedings, regardless of the type of manner, see themselves as “sitting ducks” who potentially are risking exposure to the virus due to the non-closure of our offices and courthouses. “We are moving into uncharted territory with COVID-19,” he said. “From high-profile cases like Lori Loughlin’s to the everyday criminal, civil, family court matters, this is a new world. Lawyers, court clerks, jurors see themselves as sitting ducks until we close down the courts.” Nelson predicts that a court closure could prove detrimental for everyone involved, but for the “Fuller House” alum, a potential delay in the trial could work in her favor. The backlash from closing the courts is going to be terrible,” he said. “People may take liberties because they can’t be held accountable by the other side racing into court. There is going to backlog for a long time to come.” “COVID-19 is wreaking havoc on our judicial system,” added Nelson. Original Article HHS Final Rules For Improved Patient Direct Access To Health Data – New COP Issued For Hospitals On March 9, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued final rules aimed at enhancing information flows in healthcare and improving patient access to their health records. The two rules, one issued by the HHS Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) and the other issued by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), are aimed at advancing health data system interoperability and patient access, including the MyHealthEData initiative, which is intended to improve patient access by making it easy for patients to control their own health data from the device or application of their choice. The ONC rule is available here and the CMS rule is available here. Interoperability: As for interoperability, the ONC rule implements computing standards and APIs (application programming interface requirements), which, when adopted by providers, will improve data flows among health care providers, and among providers and patients. It is anticipated that mobile apps, developed in conformity with the new standards, will give patients near complete and immediate access to their health records from all providers. The rule also addresses information blocking and seek to remove barriers to information sharing across diverse platforms. Health Plans are also Covered: Payors are covered by the new rules as well. Beginning January 1, 2021, Medicare Advantage, Medicaid, CHIP, and plans on the federal exchanges will be required to make claims data and other health information available to patients in compliant and secure format. We note that at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Annual Conference in Las Vegas, the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Seema Verma specifically called on all healthcare insurers to follow CMS’s lead and give patients access to their claims data in a digital format. We anticipate that other payors will adopt the federal access standards even though not all of their products are not directly subject to the new rules. In other words, if a plan is required to invest and comply for its Medicare Advantage product, it would make sense for it to roll out the interoperability and patient access across all of its products, and spread the costs over its full product line. New COP for Hospitals: An additional part of the new CMS rule adds a new Condition of Participation for hospitals. It requires them to send an electronic notification to other healthcare facilities and providers whenever a patient is admitted, discharged, or transferred to another level of care from the hospital. It is anticipated that these notifications will encourage more timely communication between the patient and the out-of- hospital providers who also care for the patient, not leaving it to the patient to provide such notification about their health status. Patient Consent Issues: Finally, the new rules heighten app and data base owners (providers) obligations to make more explicit the privacy policies and opt-out processes for patients to manage and secure their health information against unconsented disclosure. The rules seek to make sure that data cannot be shared with third parties without the explicit and knowledgeable consent of the patient. These new rules are intended to address the potential downside of the new data sharing standardization protocols, namely that patient data (which is valuable for research, analytics, and marketing, among other things) may be more easily shared by everyone who has access, not just the patient. The rules seek to introduce a required patient consent before data is sent to any outside analytics or marketing company. Many have already commented that these rules may not go far enough, so there is perhaps the chance additional regulation will be forthcoming. Nelson Hardiman lawyers are experts in the new regulatory framework advancing interoperability and patient access, and we are happy to address any questions you may have about these new rules. For more information, please contactLara Compton ([email protected]), Kathryn Edgerton ([email protected]), orRob Fuller ([email protected]). Katherine Bowles Appointed to the California Lawyers Association Health Law Standing Committee Nelson Hardiman is proud to announce that attorney Katherine Bowles has been appointed to theCalifornia Lawyers Association Health Law Standing Committee.

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