Effective immediately, the FOIA provides no protection at all to deceased individuals. However, HIPAA is precisely the opposite in that the records are immediately sealed and the right to open it passes with the rest of the estate. I should note, I am not a lawyer and you should not take this as legal advice.

> I should note, I am not a lawyer

That's the default setting unless you modify it.

> you should not take this as legal advice.

So is it true or not?

It's not advice of any form, it's either a fact or it is not.

It seems like your interest is pedantic combat, not the law, but here is some information anyway.

FOIA: https://secure.ssa.gov/apps9/eFOIA-FEWeb/internet/main.jsp

HIPAA: http://www.cga.ct.gov/2013/rpt/2013-R-0124.htm

It seems HIPAA enacts a 50-year period of silence.

Why would they? Privacy means nothing to the non-existent.

It could mean something to their families, though. That may not be enough for it to be law, but I'm sure a lot of families would prefer that if something troubling came up after their loved one died, no one else would have to find out.

That's your opinion and doesn't answer the question at all.

At least for health records, you do have privacy after you die, apparently for 50 years: http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/understanding/covereden...

I didn't state an opinion, I asked a question and then I stated a fact, an indisputable one that is not opinion, perhaps you should read it again.

If it pleases living people to think that they will have a right to privacy after they die, or to force other people to not pry into their dead relatives secrets, living people could easily craft a right to privacy for the deceased.

Sure they could, but those are rights for the living relatives; the dead don't exist to have rights.