BILL NUMBER: AB 1278 CHAPTERED 09/30/05 CHAPTER 430 FILED WITH SECRETARY OF STATE SEPTEMBER 30, 2005 APPROVED BY GOVERNOR SEPTEMBER 30, 2005 PASSED THE ASSEMBLY SEPTEMBER 1, 2005 PASSED THE SENATE AUGUST 30, 2005 AMENDED IN SENATE AUGUST 24, 2005 AMENDED IN SENATE JULY 6, 2005 AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MAY 4, 2005 AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY APRIL 13, 2005 INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Emmerson FEBRUARY 22, 2005 An act to amend Sections 102425, 102426, 102430, 102440, 103025, 103526, and 103526.5 of the Health and Safety Code, relating to vital records. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST AB 1278, Emmerson Vital records. Existing law requires the Director of Health Services, as the State Registrar of Vital Statistics, to administer the registration of births, deaths, fetal deaths, and marriages. Existing law requires the certificate of live birth to contain information necessary to establish the fact of live birth as well as medical and social information. This bill would revise the medical and social information to be included on a certificate of live birth relating to prenatal activities and procedures and principal sources of payment for prenatal care and delivery. Existing law requires the State Registrar to appoint a Vital Statistics Advisory Committee to, among other duties, review and make recommendations to the State Registrar as to proposals for addition or deletion of items on the certificate of live birth and advise the State Registrar on the content and format of the certificate. This bill would require the advisory committee to conduct a review of the contents of the certificate of live birth to coincide with decennial revisions by the National Center for Health Statistics to the United States Standard Certificate of Live Birth, and to make recommendations to the State Registrar regarding the adoption of modifications to the state certificate of live birth that are similar to those made to the federal certificate. Existing law requires the State Registrar to publish within 90 days of receipt of recommendations by the advisory committee a list of recommendations adopted and a list of the recommendations not adopted, with reasons for the action. This bill would require the State Registrar, notwithstanding the above requirement, to review the advisory committee's recommendations and, at the State Registrar's discretion, to submit to the Legislature, for approval, additions or deletions to the certificate of live birth. Existing law requires the State Registrar to instruct all local registrars that have automated birth registration to electronically capture the mother's marital status in an electronic file and would prohibit this information from being transcribed onto the actual hardcopy of the certificate of live birth. This bill would require the State Registrar to instruct the local registrars to collect additional information relating to, among other things, the mother's mailing address, height, weight, and smoking habits. The imposition of this new requirement on local registrars would impose a state-mandated local program. Existing law requires the certificate of fetal death to contain a 1st section containing those items necessary to establish the fact of fetal death, and a 2nd section containing those items relating to medical and health data. This bill would require that the information contained in the 2nd section be kept confidential and be labeled accordingly. Existing law provides that the medical and social information contained in a certificate of live birth shall be confidential and limits access to this confidential information to certain persons and entities. This bill would provide that the 2nd section of the certificate of fetal death relating to medical and health data and the electronic file of certain birth information shall similarly be confidential, and would authorize access by the county coroner and certain other persons and entities to that confidential information as well as to the medical and social information contained in a certificate of live birth. Existing law, commencing January 1, 2006, prohibits local registrars and county recorders from issuing informational certified copies of birth and death certificates from any source other than the statewide database prepared by the State Registrar. This bill would change the operative date of this prohibition from January 1, 2006, to July 1, 2007. Existing law requires all certified copies of birth and death records issued by the State Registrar, local registrar, or county recorder to be printed on chemically sensitized security paper. Existing law also requires these entities to issue an informational certified copy of these documents under certain circumstances. Existing law, commencing January 1, 2006, requires that the security paper used for informational certified copies of birth and death records also contain a statement in perforated type that states "INFORMATIONAL, NOT A VALID DOCUMENT TO ESTABLISH IDENTITY." This bill would change the operative date for this requirement from January 1, 2006, to July 1, 2007. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to these statutory provisions. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. Section 102425 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 102425. (a) The certificate of live birth for any live birth occurring on or after January 1, 1980, shall contain those items necessary to establish the fact of the birth and shall contain only the following information: (1) Full name and sex of the child. (2) Date of birth, including month, day, hour, and year. (3) Place of birth. (4) Full name of the father, birthplace, and date of birth of the father including month, day, and year. If the parents are not married to each other, the father's name shall not be listed on the birth certificate unless the father and the mother sign a voluntary declaration of paternity at the hospital before the birth certificate is prepared. The birth certificate may be amended to add the father' s name at a later date only if paternity for the child has been established by a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction or by the filing of a voluntary declaration of paternity. (5) Full birth name of the mother, birthplace, and date of birth of the mother including month, day, and year. (6) Multiple births and birth order of multiple births. (7) Signature, and relationship to the child, of a parent or other informant, and date signed. (8) Name, title, and mailing address of the attending physician and surgeon or principal attendant, signature, and certification of live birth by the attending physician and surgeon or principal attendant or certifier, date signed, and name and title of the certifier if other than the attending physician and surgeon or principal attendant. (9) Date accepted for registration and signature of local registrar. (10) A state birth certificate number and local registration district and number. (11) A blank space for entry of the date of death with a caption reading "Date of Death." (b) In addition to the items listed in subdivision (a), the certificate of live birth shall contain the following medical and social information, provided that the information is kept confidential pursuant to Sections 102430 and 102447 and is clearly labeled "Confidential Information for Public Health Use Only": (1) Birth weight. (2) Pregnancy history. (3) Race and ethnicity of the mother and father. (4) Residence address of the mother. (5) A blank space for entry of census tract for the mother's address. (6) Date of first prenatal care visit, the number of prenatal care visits, and commencing January 1, 2007, the date of last prenatal care visit. (7) Date of last normal menses and, commencing January 1, 2007, an obstetric estimate of completed weeks of gestation at delivery. (8) Description of complications and procedures of pregnancy and concurrent illnesses, congenital malformation, and any complication or procedure of labor and delivery, including surgery, provided that this information is essential medical information and appears in total on the face of the certificate. (9) Commencing January 1, 2007, hearing screen results. (10) Mother's and father's occupations and kind of business or industry. (11) Education level of the mother and father. (12) Principal source of payment for prenatal care, which shall include the following: Medi-Cal, private insurance, self-pay, other sources, and any other categories as may be determined by the State Department of Health Services. (13) Expected principal source of payment for delivery, which shall include the following: Medi-Cal, private insurance, self-pay, other sources, and any other categories as may be determined by the State Department of Health Services. (14) An indication of whether or not the child's parent desires the automatic issuance of a social security number to the child. (15) On and after January 1, 1995, the social security numbers of the mother and father, unless subdivision (b) of Section 102150 applies. (c) Paragraph (8) of subdivision (b) shall be completed by the attending physician and surgeon or the attending physician and surgeon's designated representative. The names and addresses of children born with congenital malformations who require followup treatment, as determined by the child's physician and surgeon, shall be furnished by the physician and surgeon to the local health officer, if permission is granted by either parent of the child. (d) The parent shall only be asked to sign the form after both the public portion and the confidential medical and social information items have been entered upon the certificate of live birth. (e) The State Registrar shall instruct all local registrars to collect the information specified in this section with respect to certificates of live birth. The information shall be transcribed on the certificate of live birth in use at the time and shall be limited to the information specified in this section. Information relating to concurrent illnesses, complications and procedures of pregnancy and delivery, and congenital malformations shall be completed by the physician and surgeon, or the physician and surgeon's designee, who shall insert in the space provided on the confidential portion of the certificate the appropriate number or numbers listed on the VS-10A supplemental worksheet. The VS-10A supplemental form shall be used as a worksheet only and shall not in any manner be linked with the identity of the child or the mother, nor submitted with the certificate to the State Registrar. All information transferred from the worksheet to the certificate shall be fully explained to the parent or other informant prior to the signing of the certificate. No questions relating to drug or alcohol abuse may be asked. (f) (1) The Vital Statistics Advisory Committee, in accordance with Section 102465, shall conduct a review of the contents of the certificate of live birth to coincide with decennial revisions by the National Center for Health Statistics to the United States Standard Certificate of Live Birth. The Vital Statistics Advisory Committee shall make recommendations to the State Registrar regarding the adoption of modifications to the state certificate of live birth that are similar to those made to the federal certificate. (2) Notwithstanding Section 102470, the State Registrar shall review the Vital Statistics Advisory Committee recommendations and, at the State Registrar's discretion, shall submit to the Legislature, for approval, additions or deletions to the certificate of live birth. SEC. 2. Section 102426 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 102426. (a) (1) In addition to the items of information collected pursuant to Section 102425, the State Registrar shall instruct all local registrars that have automated birth registration to electronically capture the information specified in paragraph (2) in an electronic file. The information shall not be transcribed onto the actual hard copy of the certificate of live birth. (2) The information required pursuant to paragraph (1) shall consist of the following: (A) The mother's marital status. (B) The mother's mailing address. The mother may designate an alternate address at her discretion. (C) Information about whether the birth mother received food for herself during the pregnancy pursuant to the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program. (D) The Activity, Pulse, Grimace, Appearance, and Respiration (Apgar) scores of 5 and 10 minutes. (E) The birth mother's prepregnancy weight, weight at delivery, and height. (F) Information about smoking before and during pregnancy, including the average number of cigarettes or packs of cigarettes smoked during the three months before pregnancy and the average number of cigarettes or packs of cigarettes smoked during each trimester of pregnancy. (3) Subparagraphs (B) to (F), inclusive, of paragraph (2) shall become operative on January 1, 2007. (b) Notwithstanding any provisions of law to the contrary, information collected pursuant to subparagraph (A) of paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) shall not under any circumstances be disclosed or available to anyone except to the department for demographic and statistical analysis, and to the federal government, without any personal identifying information, for demographic and statistical analysis. SEC. 3. Section 102430 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 102430. (a) The second section of the certificate of live birth as specified in subdivision (b) of Section 102425, the electronic file of birth information collected pursuant to subparagraphs (B) to (F), inclusive, of paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 102426, and the second section of the certificate of fetal death as specified in Section 103025, shall be confidential. Access to the confidential portion of any certificate of live birth or fetal death, and the electronic file of birth information collected pursuant to subparagraphs (B) to (F), inclusive, of paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 102426, shall be limited to the following: (1) Department staff. (2) Local registrar's staff and local health department staff when approved by the local registrar or local health officer, respectively. (3) The county coroner. (4) Persons with a valid scientific interest as determined by the State Registrar, who are engaged in demographic, epidemiological or other similar studies related to health, and who agree to maintain confidentiality as prescribed by this part and by regulation of the State Registrar. (5) The parent who signed the certificate or, if no parent signed the certificate, the mother. (6) The person named on the certificate. (7) Any person who has petitioned to adopt the person named on the certificate of live birth, subject to Section 102705 of the Health and Safety Code and Sections 9200 and 9203 of the Family Code. (b) The department shall maintain an accurate record of all persons who are given access to the confidential portion of the certificates. The record shall include: the name of the person authorizing access; name, title, and organizational affiliation of persons given access; dates of access; and specific purpose for which information is to be used. The record of access shall be open to public inspection during normal operating hours of the department. (c) All research proposed to be conducted using the confidential medical and social information on the birth certificate or fetal death certificate shall first be reviewed by the appropriate committee constituted for the protection of human subjects that is approved by the federal Department of Health and Human Services and has a general assurance pursuant to Part 46 of Title 45 of the Code of Federal Regulations. No information shall be released until the request for information has been reviewed by the Vital Statistics Advisory Committee and the committee has recommended to the State Registrar that the information shall be released. SEC. 4. Section 102440 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 102440. Notwithstanding Sections 102425 and 102430, the department may transmit to the Social Security Administration the information necessary to issue a social security number to a child in a case where the child's parent has requested the issuance pursuant to paragraph (14) of subdivision (b) of Section 102425. SEC. 5. Section 103025 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 103025. The certificate of fetal death shall contain items as may be designated by the State Registrar and shall be divided into two sections. The first section shall contain those items necessary to establish the fact of the fetal death. The second section shall contain those items relating to medical and health data and shall be clearly labeled "Confidential Information for Public Health Use Only." The information included in the second section shall be kept confidential pursuant to Section 102430. SEC. 6. Section 103526 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 103526. (a) If the State Registrar, local registrar, or county recorder receives a written or faxed request for a certified copy of a birth or death record pursuant to Section 103525, or a military service record pursuant to Section 6107 of the Government Code, that is accompanied by a notarized statement sworn under penalty of perjury, or a faxed copy of a notarized statement sworn under penalty of perjury, that the requester is an authorized person, as defined in this section, that official may furnish a certified copy to the applicant in accordance with Section 103525 and in accordance with Section 6107 of the Government Code. If a written request for a certified copy of a military service record is submitted to a county recorder by fax, the county recorder may furnish a certified copy of the military record to the applicant in accordance with Section 103525. A faxed notary acknowledgment accompanying a faxed request received pursuant to this subdivision for a certified copy of a birth or death record or a military service record shall be legible and, if the notary's seal is not photographically reproducible, show the name of the notary, the county of the notary's principal place of business, the notary's telephone number, the notary's registration number, and the notary's commission expiration date typed or printed in a manner that is photographically reproducible below, or immediately adjacent to, the notary's signature in the acknowledgment. If a request for a certified copy of a birth or death record is made in person, the official shall take a statement sworn under penalty of perjury that the requester is signing his or her own legal name and is an authorized person, and that official may then furnish a certified copy to the applicant. (b) In all other circumstances, the certified copy provided to the applicant shall be an informational certified copy and shall display a legend that states "INFORMATIONAL, NOT A VALID DOCUMENT TO ESTABLISH IDENTITY." The legend shall be placed on the certificate in a manner that will not conceal information. (c) For purposes of this section, an "authorized person" is any of the following: (1) The registrant or a parent or legal guardian of the registrant. (2) A party entitled to receive the record as a result of a court order, or an attorney or a licensed adoption agency seeking the birth record in order to comply with the requirements of Section 3140 or 7603 of the Family Code. (3) A member of a law enforcement agency or a representative of another governmental agency, as provided by law, who is conducting official business. (4) A child, grandparent, grandchild, sibling, spouse, or domestic partner of the registrant. (5) An attorney representing the registrant or the registrant's estate, or any person or agency empowered by statute or appointed by a court to act on behalf of the registrant or the registrant's estate. (6) Any agent or employee of a funeral establishment who acts within the course and scope of his or her employment and who orders certified copies of a death certificate on behalf of any individual specified in paragraphs (1) to (5), inclusive, of subdivision (a) of Section 7100. (d) Any person who asks the agent or employee of a funeral establishment to request a death certificate on his or her behalf warrants the truthfulness of his or her relationship to the decedent, and is personally liable for all damages occasioned by, or resulting from, a breach of that warranty. (e) Notwithstanding any other provision of law: (1) Any member of a law enforcement agency or a representative of a state or local government agency, as provided by law, who orders a copy of a record to which subdivision (a) applies in conducting official business may not be required to provide the notarized statement required by subdivision (a). (2) An agent or employee of a funeral establishment who acts within the course and scope of his or her employment and who orders death certificates on behalf of individuals specified in paragraphs (1) to (5), inclusive, of subdivision (a) of Section 7100 shall not be required to provide the notarized statement required by subdivision (a). (f) Informational certified copies of birth and death certificates issued pursuant to subdivision (b) shall only be printed from the single statewide database prepared by the State Registrar and shall be electronically redacted to remove any signatures for purposes of compliance with this section. Local registrars and county recorders shall not issue informational certified copies of birth and death certificates from any source other than the statewide database prepared by the State Registrar. This subdivision shall become operative on July 1, 2007. (g) This section shall become operative on July 1, 2003. SEC. 7. Section 103526.5 of the Health and Safety Code is amended to read: 103526.5. (a) Each certified copy of a birth or death record issued pursuant to Section 103525 shall include the date issued, the name of the issuing officer, the signature of the issuing officer, whether that is the State Registrar, local registrar, county recorder, or county clerk, or an authorized facsimile thereof, and the seal of the issuing office. (b) (1) All certified copies of birth and death records issued pursuant to Section 103525 shall be printed on chemically sensitized security paper that measures 81/2 by 11 inches and that has the following features: (A) Intaglio print. (B) Latent image. (C) Fluorescent, consecutive numbering with matching barcode. (D) Microprint line. (E) Prismatic printing. (F) Watermark. (G) Void pantograph. (H) Fluorescent security threads. (I) Fluorescent fibers. (J) Any other security features deemed necessary by the State Registrar. (2) In addition to the security features required by paragraph (1), commencing July 1, 2007, the security paper used for informational certified copies of birth and death records pursuant to subdivision (b) of Section 103526 shall also contain a statement in perforated type that states "INFORMATIONAL, NOT A VALID DOCUMENT TO ESTABLISH IDENTITY." (c) The State Registrar, local registrars, county recorders, and county clerks shall take precautions to ensure that uniform and consistent standards are used statewide to safeguard the security paper described in subdivision (b), including, but not limited to, the following measures: (1) Security paper shall be maintained under secure conditions so as not to be accessible to the public. (2) A log shall be kept of all visitors allowed in the area where security paper is stored. (3) All spoilage shall be accounted for and subsequently destroyed by shredding on the premises. (d) This section shall become operative on July 1, 2003. SEC. 8. If the Commission on State Mandates determines that this act contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement to local agencies and school districts for those costs shall be made pursuant to Part 7 (commencing with Section 17500) of Division 4 of Title 2 of the Government Code.