Prohibition of discriminatory practices and the Right to Be Forgotten in access to credit and insurance contracts by people who have overcome or mitigated situations of aggravated health risk or disability The Portuguese Parliament has approved Law no. 75/2021 of 18th November, which enshrines the right to be forgotten for people who have overcome or mitigated situations of aggravated health risk or disability, improving their access to credit and insurance contracts and which will come into force on 1st January 2022.
This Law amended Law 46/2006, of 28th August, which prohibits and punishes discrimination on the grounds of disability and the existence of aggravated health risk as well as the legal regime of the insurance contract, approved in annex to Decree Law 72/2008, of 16th April.
The law establishes that people who have overcome or mitigated situations of aggravated health risk or disability have, as consumers, the right to be forgotten when contracting housing credit and consumer credit, as well as when contracting insurance associated with said credit, ensuring that they cannot be subject to an increase in the insurance premium or exclusion from insurance contract warranties.
It is also established that no health information regarding the medical condition that gave rise to the aggravated health risk or disability may be collected or processed by credit institutions or insurers in a pre-contractual context and also that no health information regarding the aggravated health risk or disability may be collected by credit institutions or insurers in a pre-contractual context as long as an uninterrupted period of 10, 5 or 2 years has passed since the end of the therapeutic protocol, depending on the type of recovery and, for the cases where the condition has been overcome, if this has happened before or after the person reached 21 years of age.
This Law also established the National Agreement on Access to Credit and Insurance, an agreement between the State and sector associations representing credit institutions, financial companies, mutual societies, welfare institutions and insurance and reinsurance companies, as well as national organisations representing people with aggravated health risks, people with disabilities and users of the health system.
The agreement aims to ensure access without discrimination to housing credit and consumer credit; that credit institutions or financial companies take into account the rights, freedoms and guarantees of people who have overcome or mitigated situations of aggravated health risk or disability; to define specific categories of data and information that may be required and processing operations of such data and information and their confidentiality guarantees; to develop a mediation mechanism between them and insurers and credit institutions and also to define general guidelines regarding the information that must be mandatorily disclosed on the websites of these institutions.
December 2021
EDGE International Lawyers
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