Posted on 07/03/2012 6:15:01 AM PDT by marktwain
Tallahassee —
A federal judge has permanently blocked a Florida law barring doctors from asking their patients about gun ownership, ruling the law unconstitutionally violates physicians’ freedom of speech.
U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke issued a permanent injunction Friday that barred the law from going into effect and rejected the state’s argument that the law was aimed at protecting gun owners from discrimination. Cooke had temporarily put the law on hold last year, after three groups of doctors sued Gov. Rick Scott within days after he signed the National Rifle Association-backed bill passed by the GOP-dominated legislature.
“This law chills practitioners’ speech in a way that impairs the provision of medical care and may ultimately harm the patient,” Cooke wrote in her 25-page ruling. “The State, through this law, inserts itself in the doctor-patient relationship, prohibiting and burdening speech necessary to the proper practice of preventive medicine, thereby preventing patients from receiving truthful, non-misleading information…. This it cannot do.”
Scott’s spokesman Lane Wright said the governor was considering his options.
Rep. Jason Brodeur, a Sanford Republican who sponsored the bill, and the Florida Senate’s general counsel, Craig Meyer, said they believed Scott would appeal.
Mobeen Rathore, president of the Florida Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said he hoped the case would be quickly resolved, for patients’ sake, “so we can continue our efforts to get them the best information, specifically preventive information to families for their children on this and all risk issues.”
The NRA and some gun owners complained that doctors were using questions about guns to discourage gun ownership. They cited the example of an Ocala pediatrician who told a couple to find a new doctor because the couple refused to answer questions about whether they owned guns and how they were stored.
But the judge chided the legislature for relying upon anecdotal evidence like that rather than empirical evidence of an alleged problem. And
lawyers for the Florida chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians and the American College of Physicians argued that what they called the “physician gag law” prevented doctors from doing their job.
Doctors routinely ask patients about safety issues related to tobacco, drugs, alcohol, chemicals and swimming pools, Bruce Manheim of the Washington, D.C.-based law firm Ropes & Gray argued. “We think the court’s decision protects the sanctity of speech between a doctor and his or her patients and ultimately advances preventive medicine and protects the safety of children,” Manheim said.
Under the “Firearm Ownership Privacy Act,” doctors and other health care professionals would have faced fines and the loss of their licenses if they asked patients about guns in the home, “unless the practitioner in good faith believes the information is relevant to the patient’s medical care or safety or the safety of others.” The law also would have imposed sanctions if doctors “unnecessarily harass a patient about firearm ownership.”
But the anti-harassment language is too vague, Cooke ruled, and “does not provide fair notice as to what range of conduct it prohibits.”
The ruling drew praise from ACLU executive director Howard Simon. The ACLU filed an amicus brief on behalf of a group of healthcare and child welfare organizations, including the Palm Beach County Medical Society.
“The attempt to gag physicians and prevent them from practicing preventive medicine is an embarrassment for every legislator who voted to throw the First Amendment rights of medical personnel out the window based on a single and flimsy anecdotal report of an alleged problem. Could there be a clearer example of why the Florida legislature is held in such low esteem?” Simon said.
Let em ask. Anyone stupid enough to provide information that is self-destructive is a fool indeed.
Good point of view. Why did they select only 'guns'?
Because they're only interested in TAKING OUR PROTECTION AWAY, NOT IN PROTECTING KIDS OR PEOPLE'S SAFETY.
PA: Are there any guns in your home?
Me: None of your business.
PA: I’ll put that down as a yes.
Me: That was not my answer. If it shows up anywhere else, I will sue you.
PA: Uh....
Me: Leave it blank.
I got another doctor immediately. They are a dime a dozen these days.
All well and good, but who is following the rule of law—the executive branch or glorious AG?
Well, the a$$holes on the SCROTUM (formerly known as the SCOTUS)ruled that it is our First Amendment rights to lie, so don’t tell the truth. Or if consider lying a sin, just give them these letters: NOYFB.
Instruct your children to do the same.
Patient to Doctor:”Do you still beat your wife”
1. Who provides your liability/malpractice insurance ?
2. What is your agent's name and phone number ?
3. Will your insurance be happy with you when they find you've been dispensing advice outside your trained and certified area ?
Works every time. . .
Do I own a gun? What’s a gun???
Only at the point of a gun. And even then....Hell no!
I just told my kids to say, if asked, that they don't know, but they will tell me (their Dad) that they were asked.
This isn't a "nanny ruling," the law that was struck down was a "nanny law." I don't need the government protecting me from a doctor's questions. If a doctor asked me (or my children) about gun ownership, I would refuse to answer. If the doctor persisted, I would find a new doctor. No government intervention needed.
The next Congress better use Article III to take out some of these judges, or they are going to be TAKEN OUT another way.
The judge said the law was too vague.
so we make it very very very specific.
we can’t just knee jerk. Those miami doctors are real political kooks. The miami doctors are always in TH groveling for dollars for their pet projects.
Just read the law and revise it in the next session.
Doctors who violate the rules risk losing their license.
How about this.
If a doctor elects to ask about firearms, they are ineligible to be self insured and must obtain malpractice insurance.
AND
they are ineligible to have hospital privileges at any hospital recieving state money or recieve state funds for their pracitices.
AND
insurance companies are free to deny coverage to the doctor for any liability arising from such inquiries.
As much as we could use more resistance to legislating-for-the-hell-of-it, I bet this guy doesn't object to it most of the time. And on this issue, if there isn't a problem, what harm will the legislation do?
BINGO
Doctor's jobs involve asking you about non-health-related issues in your personal life? News to me. No wonder they're always bitching about not having sufficient time with each patient. Maybe if they just look at the sore throat that brought the patient in and skip the social engineering, their schedule would be easier on them.
Does anyone in your household ever place their genitals in your rectum or anyone elses? This is a serious health hazard. How many mommies do you have? Daddies?
Agreed. Further, it turns the children into spies agaist their parents.
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