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> Well, it's the government that keeps health data sort of confidential now.

The government plays almost no role in keeping most health data confidential, since most PHI is held by private entities.

And it's not like the government has a great track record of what little PHI it is responsible for - there have been plenty of breaches against CMS and Medicare affecting large numbers of patients.

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Without the US government playing it's current role, I am 100% confident that the US health data that is currently confidential would stop being confidential. Just as we see with companies adding spyware to software, selling out user's data is profitable.

Why would for-profit companies keep the data confidential when they can make more money selling it?

> Without the US government playing it's current role, I am 100% confident that the US health data that is currently confidential would stop being confidential.

The fact that the government has passed a law that requires private entities to keep PHI confidential says nothing about their competence in managing PHI of their own. The original claim is about the latter.

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