California Health and Safety Code 24176 – (a) Any person who is primarily responsible for conduct of a …
(a) Any person who is primarily responsible for conduct of a medical experiment and who negligently allows the experiment to be conducted without a subject’s informed consent, as provided in this chapter, shall be liable to the subject in an amount not to exceed ten thousand dollars ($10,000), as determined by the court. The minimum amount of damages awarded shall be five hundred dollars ($500).
(b) Any person who is primarily responsible for the conduct of a medical experiment and who willfully fails to obtain the subject’s informed consent, as provided in this chapter, shall be liable to the subject in an amount not to exceed twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) as determined by the court. The minimum amount of damages awarded shall be one thousand dollars ($1,000).
Terms Used In California Health and Safety Code 24176
- County: includes city and county. See California Health and Safety Code 14
- Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
- Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
- informed consent: means the authorization given pursuant to Section 24175 to have a medical experiment performed after each of the following conditions have been satisfied:
California Health and Safety Code 24173
- medical experiment: means :
California Health and Safety Code 24174
- Person: means any person, firm, association, organization, partnership, business trust, corporation, limited liability company, or company. See California Health and Safety Code 19
(c) Any person who is primarily responsible for the conduct of a medical experiment and who willfully fails to obtain the subject’s informed consent, as provided in this chapter, and thereby exposes a subject to a known substantial risk of serious injury, either bodily harm or psychological harm, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed one year or a fine of fifty thousand dollars ($50,000), or both.
(d) Any representative or employee of a pharmaceutical company, who is directly responsible for contracting with another person for the conduct of a medical experiment, and who has knowledge of risks or hazards with respect to the experiment, and who willfully withholds information of the risks and hazards from the person contracting for the conduct of the medical experiment, and thereby exposes a subject to substantial risk of serious injury, either bodily harm or psychological harm, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed one year or a fine of fifty thousand dollars ($50,000), or both.
(e) Each and every medical experiment performed in violation of any provision of this chapter is a separate and actionable offense.
(f) Any attempted or purported waiver of the rights guaranteed, or requirements prescribed by this chapter, whether by a subject or by a subject’s conservator or guardian, or other representative, as specified in Section 24175, is void.
(g) Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or expand the right of an injured subject to recover damages under any other applicable law.
(Amended by Stats. 2003, Ch. 397, Sec. 2. Effective January 1, 2004.)