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Tex. Health & Safety Code § 311.022

DISCRIMINATION PROHIBITED IN DENIAL OF SERVICES; CRIMINAL PENALTIES

Applied in 9 court decisions — leading case National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (2012)

Most recently applied in McAllen Hospitals, L.P. v. Salvador Gonzalez, Individually, as Representative of the Estate of Santos Camacho, and as Representative of the Statutory Wrongful-Death Beneficiaries of Santos Camacho (December 2018)

Acts 1989, 71st Leg., ch. 678, Sec. 1, eff

How often courts cite this section

199120002010201820
citing decisions per year

Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(a) An officer, employee, or medical staff member of a general hospital may not deny emergency services because a person cannot establish the person's ability to pay for the services or because of the person's race, religion, or national ancestry if:

(1) the services are available at the hospital; and

(2) the person is diagnosed by a licensed physician as requiring those services.

(b) An officer or employee of a general hospital may not deny a person in need of emergency services access to diagnosis by a licensed physician on the hospital staff because the person cannot establish the person's ability to pay for the services or because of the person's race, religion, or national ancestry.

(c) In addition, the person needing emergency services may not be subjected to arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable discrimination based on age, sex, physical condition, or economic status.

(d) An officer, employee, or medical staff member of a general hospital commits an offense if that person recklessly violates this section. An offense under this subsection is a Class B misdemeanor, except that if the offense results in permanent injury, permanent disability, or death, the offense is a Class A misdemeanor.

(e) An officer, employee, or medical staff member of a general hospital commits an offense if that person intentionally or knowingly violates this section. An offense under this subsection is a Class A misdemeanor, except that if, as a direct result of the offense, a person denied emergency services dies, the offense is a felony of the third degree.

Official source: Texas Constitution and Statutes. Reproduced from public-domain Texas statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.