This strikes me as considerably more than plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit here would get for a similar breach. Amy Woolvett reports from Nova Scotia:
Cheques were delivered last week surrounding the privacy breach of hundreds of people at Roseway Hospital. Victims of the breach are each being issued a $1,000 cheque.
On June 22, the Nova Scotia Supreme Court in Halifax ruled on a class action lawsuit, saying that Roseway Hospital had up to 40 days to pay out $1 million in total. In addition to the individual payouts to those who privacy was breach, the remainder of the money will pay the legal fees.
In 2012, the South West Nova District Health Authority sent letters to 707 people explaining that their privacy had been breached when it was discovered an admissions clerk, Cheryl Decker, had inappropriately accessed several hundred patient files. She was reportedly only authorized to look at a dozen of those files.
Read more on Shelbourne County Coast Guard.