Several health-related bills continue moving forward as Florida’s Legislature hits the half-way mark. The issues include:
A late –term abortion bill (HB 1047) would redefine Florida’s definition of illegal late-term abortions. The bill, which would ban aborts when a fetus is viable, is ready to be voted on, according to the Miami Herald. The Senate’s version (SB 918) still has two more committee stops.
The Florida Senate’s tweaking of a plan to simplify testing for severely disabled students has upset an Orlando mom. Ethan Rediske’s mom, Andrea, has been fighting to make such exemptions easier to obtain for students like her late son, who had significant disabilities, the Orlando Sentinel reports. Florida’s current law only allows exemptions from the FCAT in “extraordinary” cases.
State senators gave unanimous passage to a bill imposing stricter rules on commercial parasailing operators. The “White-Miskell Act” would prohibit commercial parasailing during certain weather conditions, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. This comes following two parasailing deaths in 2007 at Pompano Beach.
And finally, the Office of Economic & Demographic Research is meeting today to help better define the role of pharmacy benefit managers, the Florida Current reports. Staff analyses have issued three disparate prices involved in the proposal ( SB 1014).