Calif. hospital system settles celeb records cases (AP)

LOS ANGELES � Years after hospital employees were accused of snooping into the medical records of celebrity patients, UCLA Health System agreed to pay an $865,000 settlement for potential violations of federal privacy laws.

The settlement that UCLA reached with federal regulators Wednesday did not name the stars involved and did not require the hospital system to admit liability.

The investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services revealed that workers repeatedly accessed patients' electronic health records between 2005 and 2008.

The hospitals have agreed to report to a federal monitor on the implementation of its corrective plan over the next three years.

In a statement Thursday, UCLA said it has taken steps over the past three years to retrain staff and strengthen its computer systems.

UCLA Hospital System CEO Dr. David T. Feinberg said the university's facilities will "remain vigilant and proactive to ensure that our patients' rights continue to be protected at all times."

In 2008, California Department of Public Health officials announced results of their own investigation into the privacy breaches and found that UCLA hospital workers inappropriately accessed records of 1,041 patients since 2003.

The hospital later disciplined 165 employees through firings, suspensions and warnings.

At least two former UCLA employees have faced criminal charges for medical privacy violations.

Former administrative specialist Lawanda Jackson, 50, pleaded guilty to selling information to the National Enquirer from the files of Britney Spears, Farrah Fawcett and other high-profile celebrities. She died from complications of breast cancer before she could be sentenced.

Former medical school researcher Huping Zhou was sentenced to four months in federal prison and fined $2,000 for reading the confidential medical files of co-workers and celebrities such as Drew Barrymore, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tom Hanks.

Zhou was not accused of selling the information and claimed that, as a Chinese national, he didn't know it was a violation of U.S. law to peep into the files.

The headline-grabbing breaches led California legislators to pass a bill boosting the maximum fine for privacy breaches at health facilities from $25,000 to $250,000.

Then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the legislation into law after his wife Maria Shriver had her records breached at UCLA Medical Center. Shriver filed for divorce last week.

The UCLA Health System includes Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center and Orthopedic Hospital, and the UCLA Medical Group, a network of primary and specialty care satellite offices.

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German parliament OKs genetic embryo tests (AP)

BERLIN � After an emotional debate, German lawmakers voted Thursday to allow a procedure that looks for genetic disorders in embryos before they are implanted in the womb.

Lawmakers voted 326-260 to permit the procedure known as pre-implantation genetic diagnosis under strict conditions after a debate that cut across party lines. Eight abstained.

The procedure is sometimes used after in-vitro fertilization, when parents whose families have a history of genetic disorders want to avoid having a child with a lethal or severely debilitating birth defect.

Elsewhere in Europe and in the U.S., the test is often used in infertile couples who have failed in previous attempts to have children while using IVF in hopes that the test will boost their chances of implanting the best embryo.

The procedure's legality had been a gray area in Germany. Parliament took up the issue after a federal court last year ruled that a doctor who had performed the procedure hadn't committed any offense.

Under the law approved Thursday, an ethics commission will have to decide on a case-by-case basis whether couples can use the procedure. An expert would have to certify that a couple's child faced a high risk of a serious genetic disorder or that a miscarriage or stillbirth was likely.

A large minority of lawmakers favored a total ban, with some saying that even limited permission for genetic selection set a bad precedent.

"This is about variety: Do we want to allow it in our society?" asked Katrin Goering-Eckardt of the opposition Greens, one of those advocating a ban.

But lawmakers who backed allowing the practice said it would be an option only in a few cases, and argued that parents who worry about possible genetic defects should be trusted to decide.

"I am firmly convinced that we should not choose to close our eyes to how we can use modern medicine appropriately to support and help these long-suffering families," said Labor Minister Ursula von der Leyen.

Opposition lawmaker Soeren Bartol said he wanted to give couples at risk of passing on genetic disorders the option of deciding to have a child.

"I would also like these parents to be spared, as far as possible, the terrible experience of a miscarriage or a still birth," he added.

Debates on procedures that involve genetic selection tend to be tinged in Germany by memories of the country's Nazi past including experiments on humans, but lawmakers didn't refer to that explicitly on Thursday.

Church leaders, however, criticized the decision. The country's top Roman Catholic bishop, Archbishop Robert Zoellitsch, said that "the selection of human embryos violates the precept of respect for human dignity" and Lutheran church leader Nikolaus Schneider said he would have liked greater restrictions.

Thursday's debate centered squarely on the morality of the procedure, a test done to pick the best embryos, rather than its medical merits � which researchers say have largely been a disappointment.

Doctors had assumed the test would improve pregnancy rates, but studies showed that women who had their embryos tested were actually less likely to become pregnant, probably because scientists still can't accurately predict which embryos will succeed.

A study in its early stages presented this week at a European fertility conference in Stockholm suggested that embryos which look problematic three days after fertilization can fix themselves by day five. Many embryos created by IVF are implanted after three days, although doctors are increasingly waiting until day five if possible.

The German motion refers to tests removing one to two cells out of an embryo about three days after its fertilization � when it typically has about eight cells � to see whether it looks abnormal. Some experts say that is too early and jeopardizes the embryo's future development.

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AP medical writer Maria Cheng contributed to this report from London.

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Obesity rates still rising in many states (AP)

WASHINGTON � In 1995, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent. Now, all but one does.

An annual obesity report by two public health groups looked for the first time at state-by-state statistics over the last two decades. The state that has the lowest obesity rate now � Colorado, with 19.8 percent of adults considered obese � would have had the highest rate in 1995.

"When you look at it year by year, the changes are incremental," says Jeffrey Levi, executive director of the Trust for America's Health, which writes the annual report with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. "When you look at it by a generation you see how we got into this problem."

The study, based on 2010 data, says a dozen states top 30 percent obesity, most of them in the South. Mississippi topped the list for the seventh year in a row, with Alabama, West Virginia, Tennessee and Louisiana close behind. Just five years ago, in 2006, Mississippi was the only state above 30 percent.

No state decreased its level of obesity, which is defined as a body mass index of 30 or more. The body mass index is a measurement based on weight and height.

There was a bit of good news in the report: Sixteen states reported increases in their obesity rates, down from 28 states that reported increases last year. Levi says those increases have been gradually slowing, most likely due to greater public awareness of health issues and government attempts to give schools and shoppers better access to healthier foods.

"We're leveling off to some degree at an unacceptably high level," Levi said.

First lady Michelle Obama has tackled the issue with her "Let's Move" campaign, pushing for healthier school lunches, more access to fruits and vegetables and more physical activity. Republicans in Congress have pushed back somewhat against some of those programs, however, saying a rewrite of school lunch rules is too costly and questioning an Obama administration effort to curb junk food marketing aimed at children.

As in previous years, the study showed that racial and ethnic minorities, along with those who have less education and make less money, have the highest obesity rates. Adult obesity rates for African-Americans topped 40 percent in 15 states, while whites topped 30 percent in only four states. About a third of adults who did not graduate from high school are obese; about a fifth of those who graduated from college are considered obese.

Dr. Mary Currier, Mississippi's state health officer, says her state has struggled to drop its No. 1 status and it has been challenging because much of the state is poor and rural.

"We live in an area of the country where eating is one of the things we do, and we eat a lot of fried foods," she said. "Trying to change that culture is pretty difficult."

She says the state has had some success by making school lunches healthier, taking high-calorie foods and drinks out of school vending machines and trying to find more low-cost exercise facilities for residents of rural areas.

"It is frustrating, but we've had some progress," Currier said. "We just have to continue to work at this. It's not something that's going to change overnight."

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