Learning to think continentally.

The US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) is proposing to enhance federal regulation intended to protect human research subjects, in particular to increase measures aimed at security of personal data. Since the ethical review process is partially based on respect for people and their autonomy, harmonization of these rules will be a process of convincing individuals and their states to accept uniform standards that give enough privacy but do not lock away personal data from either research participants or researchers.