Anti-Torture Bill moves in Assembly

ALBANY - Physicians and other health care professionals licensed by New York would be prohibited from participating in torture or improper treatment of a prisoner under a bill approved by a key Assembly Committee today. The bill, A. 6665, is sponsored by Assembly Health Committee chair Richard N. Gottfried and Senate Health Committee chair Thomas K. Duane. It was favorably reported today by the Assembly Higher Education Committee, which has jurisdiction over professional licensure, and now goes to the Assembly Codes Committee, which reviews bills that have a penalty provision.

Citing recently-disclosed Justice Department documents on the role of health care practitioners in CIA "enhanced interrogation techniques," Gottfried said: "Whether one regards waterboarding or abdominal slapping as 'enhanced interrogation' or torture, we should not be sending young people to medical school and giving them a license to practice healing so they can aid and enable a police officer, prison guard, or CIA agent to inflict pain and suffering. This bill would protect patients in the community from having their bodies put in the hands of people who had misused their medical education, training and license in that way."

The bill has 30 co-sponsors in both parties in the Assembly and is the first of its kind in the nation, Gottfried said.

The bill has been endorsed by: The Center for Constitutional Rights, Physicians for Human Rights, National Association of Social Workers -- NYS Chapter, and the NYS Nurse Practitioners Association.

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