Montana committee hears bill to require aggregate public-health reporting during declared emergencies

Representative Bill Mercer on Wednesday asked the House Health and Human Services Committee to require the Department of Public Health and Human Services to publish aggregate public-health data by age cohort, gender, hospitalizations and deaths during a governor-declared public health emergency.

"There was a deficit of information in terms of who was being affected and how they were being affected in sort of age-specific cohorts," Mercer said, describing the bill as a narrow effort to give the public clearer, actionable data in future emergencies.

Mercer said the bill is intended to produce statewide, aggregated counts that would not disclose individually identifiable information. "If the committee feels strongly that there needs to be some change, I'm certainly open to that," he said, adding that the department has proposed an amendment he has not yet received in final form.

Laura Williamson, the department’s state epidemiologist, provided informational testimony about what the agency currently tracks and how it reported during the COVID-19 pandemic. "We did this during the COVID-nineteen public health emergency, where we reported the number of tests, cases, hospitalizations, and deaths each day," Williamson said, noting that daily reporting was "a big lift" because data elements lived in multiple systems and required manual collating.

Williamson described the department’s dashboard development during COVID — a once-daily public dashboard that included county and age breakdowns, later scaled back from seven days a week to weekdays, and ultimately retired in 2023. She also said the department can and does report additional details when epidemiologically appropriate but that how to partition age bands depends on the condition and on avoiding disclosure when cell sizes are small.

Supporters included Rhonda Wiggers of the Montana Broadcasters Association, who said the association favors wider public reporting. "We believe in sharing information with the public and think this is good policy," Wiggers told the committee.

Several lawmakers pressed both the sponsor and the epidemiologist on specifics. Representative Zephyr and Representative Cunningham questioned the age bands in the bill and whether child-age groups should be broken into infants, toddlers and school-age cohorts; the sponsor said he drafted bands for more granularity but is open to committee amendments. "I'm a pediatrician," Cunningham said, arguing that younger age groups often respond to diseases differently.

Other members raised privacy and geographic concerns. Vice Chair Howell warned that in a sparsely populated state, reporting certain underlying conditions or geographic detail could risk re-identifying individuals: "I worry in a rural state like Montana that there could be the potential that we are disclosing health information about people that could be connected to their personal identity." Mercer said the bill’s statewide aggregation is intended to reduce that risk and said regional reporting could be discussed as language is refined.

Williamson said the department has used death certificates and case-investigation interviews to compile comorbidity information in past reporting, but that those data flows required significant staff time and technical work to assemble. On legal authority, Williamson told members the department currently has statutory authority to disseminate public-health data and cited the relevant Montana Code Annotated provision during testimony.

No vote was taken on the bill. Mercer closed by urging a framework that ensures core disclosures in future declared emergencies and by saying he would work with the department and committee on amendments. Chair Marshall closed the hearing and noted the committee will take executive action the next day on two Medicaid-expansion bills (HB 245 and HB 230).

The committee record includes informational testimony from the Department of Public Health and Human Services and one proponent statement from the Montana Broadcasters Association; members asked for clarifying amendments on age bands, geographic granularity and safeguards to prevent re-identification.