• SB156
This bill provided a $300,000 cap on noneconomic damages in lawsuits, required members of a class in a class action lawsuit to agree to participate, and capped legal fees at no more than 25 percent of a judgment or settlement.
Our position: This bill was a giveaway to greedy corporations, reckless doctors and absentee nursing home owners. The fee cap was an affront to the free market and would have barred the courthouse doors to injured Oklahomans.
• SB1745
This bill prohibited compiling and accessing a digitally transferable record of driver’s license information for commercial purposes.
Our position: Apart from its usefulness in preventing identity theft, this bill would have put a stop to tobacco companies' onerous practice of scanning bar-hoppers' drivers' licenses in exchange for free knickknacks and tobacco. The state's fiscal and medical health depends on reducing tobacco use. Allowing tobacco companies to hook a new generation of smokers is a big step backward.
• HB3146
This bill established when teachers and other education personnel wouldn’t be held liable and provided punishments for making false accusations against education employees.
Our position: Just because a teacher, principal, aide or coach is acting within the scope of employment doesn’t mean things can’t go wrong. This law ties parents’ hands when something happens to their children at school. Also, given the confidential, he-said she-said nature of complaints against school personnel, determining who’s telling the truth often is exceedingly difficult. This law could be used to intimidate students and parents who have been mistreated.
• HB2590
This bill provided immunity for computer technicians and film and print processors who find images of child abuse or child pornography and report them to authorities.
Our position: We don’t believe blanket immunity is a good thing. Individual circumstances demand individual attention. Child abuse and pornography are reprehensible, but immunity won’t encourage greater reporting.
• HB2764
This bill allowed Pharmacy Board compliance officers to confiscate records and the board to require repayment of costs associated with an investigation. This bill also made it illegal to knowingly violate an Agreed Order or Board Order.
Our position: Giving compliance officers more teeth to do their jobs will help keep pharmacies safe and law-abiding. As for Agreed Orders and Board Orders — they’re not suggestions, they’re requirements. Violating either should be punished.
• HB2677
This bill provided as much as $25,000 a year in education loan repayment for up to five years for as many as six Oklahoma-licensed primary care physicians.
Our position: Preventative medicine and primary care physicians will do more to improve Oklahomans’ health than new tests and machines. As the state and nation face a looming shortage of primary care doctors, efforts to encourage doctors-in-training to choose the field will help.
• HB2814
This bill prohibited recovering damages in some wrongful life and wrongful birth claims.
Our position: Sometimes women aren't given enough information to choose to terminate their pregnancies. Improper sterilization techniques also can leave a woman pregnant while she thought it wasn't possible. This bill would have kept some women from being able to sue when they delivered children they didn't want or couldn't support.
• HB3380
This bill prohibited uninsured drivers from receiving noneconomic damages in car wrecks.
Our position: All Oklahomans should have car insurance. However, being seriously injured in a wreck that is someone else’s fault is worse than not having insurance. When this happens, even uninsured drivers ought to be able to sue and collect noneconomic damages. This law would limit people’s rights without having any effect on the number of uninsured drivers.
• HB3111
This bill required health insurance mandates to be introduced only in odd-numbered years and forced advocates to submit reports detailing the financial and social effects of their proposals.
Our position: This bill is an obvious freebie for the insurance lobby. It would require health insurance mandate advocates to submit costly reports dealing with their proposals’ financial and social impacts. Also, by arbitrarily requiring mandates to be introduced in odd-numbered years and passed in even-numbered years, this bill would have almost guaranteed mandates would fail.
• HB2704
This bill established a long-term care facility for sex offenders.
Our position: Sex offenders are aging as the rest of the population ages. They, too, will need long-term care. Establishing a special facility to care for sex offenders makes Oklahomans in other long-term care facilities safer.
• SB1600
This bill made elder abuse a felony, provided associated penalties and made offenders potentially subject to the Elderly and Incapacitated Victims Protection Act.
Our position: The elderly are especially vulnerable to abuse because of their reliance on others and access to nest eggs. This bill rightly toughens penalties for those who abuse them, whether sexually, financially or otherwise.
• SB1789
This bill increased the amount of time complaints against chiropractors stay on their records when the Board of Chiropractic Examiners fails to impose a penalty.
Our position: The longer Oklahoma patients have to research complaints against their doctors and evaluate the quality of care they may receive, the better informed they will be.
• HB2490
This bill provided minimum, uniform standards for audits of pharmacy records and established an appeal process for unfavorable audits.
Our position: Uniform standards for audits ensure they are conducted fairly and consistently. Greater scrutiny of charges from pharmacies and health care providers will result in savings.
• HB2245
This bill required individuals to be notified when a breach of security involves their personal information.
Our position: Your information belongs to you, not t your hospital, car dealer, banker or favorite Web site. When disclosure of your personal information puts you at risk, you should be told about it as quickly as possible so you can protect yourself from identity theft.
• HB 2458
This bill required an expert's consent before a medical malpractice lawsuit could be filed.
Our position: Apart from its likely unconstitutionality, this bill would have shut out Oklahomans injured by doctors’ mistakes. The state is not facing a lawsuit crisis, and this bill was nothing but a sop to insurance companies at the expense of injured and sick Oklahomans.
• HB2863
This bill required day care centers to carry liability insurance.
Our position: The tragic injuries 3-year-old Demarion Pittman suffered after being left in a hot car following a day care field trip and his family’s subsequent medical bills showed the need for day care liability insurance.
• SB2182
This bill created an Uninsured Motorists Victims Compensation Board and established a fee to fund it.
Our position: Too many drivers don’t have insurance, leaving those who obey the law to face huge bills after accidents that aren’t their fault.
• SB2117
This bill required those who offer vehicle warranties to register with the Oklahoma Insurance Department and established greater disclosure for warranties.
Our position: Consumers need as much information as possible when choosing whether to buy a warranty.
• SB1521
This bill required insurance companies to pay for routine medical care for those who participate in clinical trials for cancer.
Our position: It’s particularly galling to see insurance companies discriminate against those who are dying. If a person in a clinical trial doesn’t have routine medical care covered while a person who isn’t in a trial does, it’s discriminating against someone who is brave enough to offer science the opportunity to improve therapies and treatments.
• SB2114
This bill required insurance companies to cover care physicians and other health care providers deem "medically necessary."
Our position: Health insurance companies should stop counting their profits and start covering things hardworking, premium-paying Oklahomans deserve to have covered.
• HB1830
This bill provided as much as $125,000 in loan repayment assistance to as many as five Oklahoma doctors annually who have completed fellowship training in geriatric medicine.
Our position: With the elderly population expected to continue to grow at a rapid pace while the number of primary care physicians fails to keep up, any effort that helps doctors choose geriatric medicine and be able to afford that choice is a step in the right direction.
• HB2531
This bill required insurance companies to cover autism treatment.
Our position: It’s pay now or pay later. The number of children with autism is skyrocketing, and they’ll have to be cared for, whether at school or home. It will be cheaper in the long run to have insurance companies help these children overcome autism than burdening schools and forcing parents to go deep into debt, sell their homes and liquidate their savings.
