European Union: Adopted opinion on the European Commission's proposal for a Regulation establishing a European Health Data Space (EHDS)

On 12 July 2022, the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) and the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) adopted an opinion on the European Commission's proposal for a Regulation establishing a European Health Data Space (EHDS), which strengthens individuals' control over their health data. The EDPB stressed the importance of clarifying the relationship between the provisions in this proposal and those in the General Data Protection Regulation and Member States' legislation. Furthermore, the EDPB and EDPS noted that there are some concerns regarding individuals' rights and freedoms, which may be brought by Chapter IV of the Proposal. In particular, the EDPB and the EDPS stated that the data obtained through wellness applications should be excluded from the “categories of electronic data for secondary use” and noted that processing of such data should be subject to prior explicit consent from the user.