Getting all their ducks in a row.

A bill, introduced today:

FIRST REGULAR SESSION

HOUSE BILL NO. 732

97TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVES HICKS (Sponsor), RHOADS, SPENCER, REIBOLDT, ROSS, HURST, LEARA, MILLER, WALKER, REMOLE, BAHR, MORRIS, FITZWATER, GUERNSEY, WILSON, FRANKLIN, SMITH (120), REHDER, FITZPATRICK, LOVE, CORNEJO, PIKE, DOHRMAN, KOLKMEYER, MCGAUGH, AUSTIN, SOMMER, HIGDON, COOKSON, PARKINSON, WOOD AND FOWLER (Co-sponsors).

1867L.01I   D. ADAM CRUMBLISS, Chief Clerk

AN ACT

To amend chapter 571, RSMo, by adding thereto one new section relating to firearms ownership and medical records.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:

           Section A. Chapter 571, RSMo, is amended by adding thereto one new section, to be known as section 571.175, to read as follows:

           571.175. No health care professional licensed in this state, other than a mental health professional as defined in section 632.005, shall inquire of any patient in conjunction with obtaining the patient’s personal information and medical history whether the patient has any firearms in the patient’s home or on the patient’s property, and shall not require the disclosure of such information prior to providing treatment.

[emphasis in original]

Previously:

HB 350: “Nobody move suddenly, he’s got a duck and he knows how to use it.” (January 29, 2013)

….571.012. 1. No health care professional licensed in this state shall be required by law to:

          (1) Inquire as to whether a patient owns a firearm;

          (2) Document or maintain in a patient’s medical records whether such patient owns a firearm; or

          (3) Notify any governmental entity of the identity of a patient based solely on the patient’s status as an owner of a firearm….

What’s past is prologue:

Blackout: How the NRA suppressed gun violence research

6:00 AM on 01/14/2013

….After Republicans won control of Congress in 1994, lawmakers allied with the NRA zeroed in on the NCIPC [National Center for Injury Prevention and Control]. “There was an immediate push not just to stop gun research, but to terminate the entire center,” Kellermann recounted.

Ultimately, NCIPC survived, but in 1996, Rep. Jay Dickey, an Arkansas Republican and the NRA’s point man in Congress, engineered an effort to cut $2.6 million from its budget-exactly the amount it had spent on gun violence research the previous year. (The funding was later restored by the Senate, but earmarked for traumatic brain injury, ensuring it couldn’t be used for gun violence work.) And the following sentence was added to the law funding CDC: “None of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control….”

Duck.

But we can’t talk about that.