Prescription Privacy Laws Get U.S. High Court Scrutiny

From Bloomberg:

The U.S. Supreme Court accepted a case that pits medical privacy interests against speech rights, agreeing to consider whether states can limit how drugmakers use data about the prescription-writing practices of doctors.

The justices today said they will review a Vermont law being challenged by a pharmaceutical industry trade group and three “data-mining” companies that help drugmakers target individual doctors with sales pitches. The 2007 Vermont law, struck down by a federal appeals court, bars use of prescription information for marketing without the doctor’s consent.