TORONTO

Toronto hospital faces class-action lawsuit over privacy breach

The Canadian Press Published Wednesday, June 25, 2014 5:21PM EDT

Patient records of mothers breached at hospital

The confidential information of more than 8,000 mothers who were patients at a Toronto hospital may have been breached after a former staff member accessed their records.

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TORONTO - A proposed class-action lawsuit has been filed against a Toronto hospital, alleging two employees sold the personal information of thousands of new mothers and their babies to an investment firm.

The statement of claim, filed this week in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, alleges the information from Rouge Valley Health System was then used to target the families for the sale of registered education savings plans.

The lawsuit is seeking damages of upwards of $300 million for the breaches that are alleged to have happened between 2009 and 2013.

The two employees -- who the hospital has said no longer work there -- are alleged to have been paid in exchange for the information of more than 8,300 patients, most of them new mothers who gave birth and their families.

The allegations have not been proven in court.

Rouge Valley did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday, but the hospital's CEO released a statement earlier this month saying it is treating the situation with "extreme gravity" and "greatly regrets that this breach occurred."