I
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 1466
To amend the Public Health Service Act to clarify liability protections
regarding emergency use of automated external defibrillators.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
FEBRUARY21, 2025
Mr. S
COTTFRANKLINof Florida (for himself, Mr. CONNOLLY, Mr. BILIRAKIS,
Mr. S
OTO, Mrs. CAMMACK, Mr. CALVERT, Mr. VANDREW, Mr. CLINE,
and Mr. B
EYER) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the
Committee on Energy and Commerce
A BILL
To amend the Public Health Service Act to clarify liability
protections regarding emergency use of automated exter-
nal defibrillators.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Cardiac Arrest Sur-4
vival Act of 2025’’. 5
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 6
Congress finds the following: 7
(1) Establishing a nationally uniform baseline 8
of protection from civil liability for persons who use 9
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automated external defibrillators (in this section re-1
ferred to as ‘‘AEDs’’) in perceived medical emer-2
gencies, who own or hold other property interests in 3
AEDs used in perceived medical emergencies, or who 4
own, occupy, or manage premises in which an AED 5
is used or from which an AED is taken for use in 6
a perceived medical emergency will encourage the 7
deployment of additional AEDs, which will ulti-8
mately save lives that would otherwise have been lost 9
to cardiac arrest. 10
(2) The current patchwork of State ‘‘Good Sa-11
maritan’’ laws provides incomplete, inconsistent, 12
and, in some instances, inadequate protection for en-13
tities considering the acquisition or deployment of 14
AEDs. In these circumstances, concerns about po-15
tential liability resulting from the good-faith acquisi-16
tion and deployment of this life-saving technology 17
are inhibiting its deployment. 18
(3) Such concerns are especially acute for enti-19
ties with operations or facilities in multiple States, 20
yet such entities are also among those in which the 21
widespread deployment of AEDs would be most ben-22
eficial. 23
(4) A nationally uniform baseline of protection 24
from civil liability is needed for persons who use 25
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AEDs in perceived medical emergencies, who own or 1
hold other property interests in AEDs used in per-2
ceived medical emergencies, or who own, occupy, or 3
manage premises in which an AED is used or from 4
which an AED is taken for use in a perceived med-5
ical emergency. 6
SEC. 3. LIABILITY REGARDING EMERGENCY USE OF AUTO-7
MATED EXTERNAL DEFIBRILLATORS. 8
Section 248 of the Public Health Service Act (42 9
U.S.C. 238q) is amended to read as follows: 10
‘‘SEC. 248. LIABILITY REGARDING EMERGENCY USE OF 11
AUTOMATED EXTERNAL DEFIBRILLATORS. 12
‘‘(a) G
OODSAMARITANPROTECTIONS.— 13
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Except as provided in sub-14
section (e), a person described in paragraph (2) is 15
immune from civil liability for any harm resulting 16
from the use or attempted use of an automated ex-17
ternal defibrillator device (in this section referred to 18
as an ‘AED’). 19
‘‘(2) G
OOD SAMARITAN DESCRIBED .—A person 20
described in this paragraph is a person who— 21
‘‘(A) uses or attempts to use an AED on 22
a victim of a perceived medical emergency, and 23
‘‘(B) is not the owner-acquirer (as defined 24
in subsection (c)(2)) of the AED. 25
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‘‘(b) PREMISESOWNER/LESSEE/MANAGERPROTEC-1
TIONS.— 2
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Except as provided in sub-3
section (e), a person described in paragraph (2) is 4
immune from civil liability for any harm resulting 5
from such use or attempted use of an AED. 6
‘‘(2) P
REMISES OWNER/LESSEE/MANAGER DE-7
SCRIBED.—A person described in this paragraph is 8
a person who— 9
‘‘(A) owns, occupies under a lease or simi-10
lar arrangement, or manages— 11
‘‘(i) the premises at which an AED is 12
used or attempted to be used on a victim 13
of a perceived medical emergency, or 14
‘‘(ii) the premises from which an AED 15
used or attempted to be used on a victim 16
of a perceived medical emergency is taken 17
for such use, and 18
‘‘(B) is not the owner-acquirer of such 19
AED. 20
‘‘(c) D
EVICEOWNER-ACQUIRERPROTECTIONS.— 21
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Except as provided in sub-22
section (e), an owner-acquirer of an AED is immune 23
from civil liability for any harm resulting from the 24
use or attempted use of such AED, unless the harm 25
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was proximately caused by the failure of the owner- 1
acquirer to properly maintain the AED according to 2
the guidelines of the manufacturer of the AED. 3
‘‘(2) O
WNER-ACQUIRER DEFINED .—For pur-4
poses of this section, the term ‘owner-acquirer’ 5
means any person who owns or has otherwise ac-6
quired a possessory property interest in an AED 7
that is used or attempted to be used on a victim of 8
a perceived medical emergency. 9
‘‘(d) A
PPLICABILITY OFIMMUNITY INCERTAINCIR-10
CUMSTANCES.—The immunity provided by subsections 11
(a), (b), and (c) of this section shall apply regardless of 12
whether— 13
‘‘(1) the AED that is used or attempted to be 14
used is marked with, or accompanied by, cautionary 15
signage; 16
‘‘(2) the AED that is used or attempted to be 17
used is registered with any government; 18
‘‘(3) the person who used or attempted to use 19
the AED saw, read, understood, complied with, or 20
attempted to comply with any cautionary signage 21
present; 22
‘‘(4) the person who used or attempted to use 23
the AED had received any training relating to the 24
use of— 25
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‘‘(A) AEDs in general; or 1
‘‘(B) the particular AED used or at-2
tempted to be used; or 3
‘‘(5) the person who used or attempted to use 4
the AED was assisted or supervised by any other 5
person, including a licensed physician. 6
‘‘(e) I
NAPPLICABILITY OF IMMUNITY IN CERTAIN 7
C
IRCUMSTANCES.—Notwithstanding subsection (d), im-8
munity under subsection (a), (b), or (c)(1) does not apply 9
to a person if— 10
‘‘(1) such person’s willful or criminal mis-11
conduct, gross negligence, reckless misconduct, or a 12
conscious, flagrant indifference to the rights or safe-13
ty of the victim proximately caused the harm in-14
volved; 15
‘‘(2) such person is a licensed or certified health 16
professional who used the AED while acting within 17
the scope of the license or certification of the profes-18
sional and within the scope of the employment or 19
agency of the professional; 20
‘‘(3) such person is a hospital, clinic, or other 21
entity whose purpose is providing health care di-22
rectly to patients, and the harm was caused by an 23
employee or agent of the entity who used the AED 24
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while acting within the scope of the employment or 1
agency of the employee or agent; or 2
‘‘(4) such person is an owner-acquirer of the 3
AED who leased the AED to a health care entity (or 4
who otherwise provided the AED to such entity for 5
compensation without selling the AED to the entity), 6
and the harm was caused by an employee or agent 7
of the entity who used the AED while acting within 8
the scope of the employment or agency of the em-9
ployee or agent. 10
‘‘(f) R
ULES OFCONSTRUCTION.— 11
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—The following apply with 12
respect to this section: 13
‘‘(A) This section does not establish any 14
cause of action, or require that an AED be 15
placed at any building or other location. 16
‘‘(B) With respect to the class of persons 17
for which this section provides immunity from 18
civil liability, this section preempts the law of 19
any State to the extent that the otherwise-appli-20
cable State law would allow for civil liability in 21
any circumstance where this section would pro-22
vide immunity from civil liability. 23
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‘‘(C) This section does not waive any pro-1
tection from liability for Federal officers or em-2
ployees under— 3
‘‘(i) section 233 of this title; or 4
‘‘(ii) sections 1346(b), 2672, and 5
2679 of title 28, United States Code, or 6
under alternative benefits provided by the 7
United States where the availability of 8
such benefits precludes a remedy under 9
section 1346(b) of such title 28. 10
‘‘(2) C
IVIL ACTIONS UNDER FEDERAL LAW .— 11
‘‘(A) I
N GENERAL.—The applicability of 12
subsections (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e) includes 13
applicability to any action for civil liability de-14
scribed in subsection (a), (b), or (c) that arises 15
under Federal law. 16
‘‘(B) F
EDERAL AREAS ADOPTING STATE 17
LAW.—If a geographic area is under Federal 18
jurisdiction and is located within a State but 19
out of the jurisdiction of the State, and if, pur-20
suant to Federal law, the law of the State ap-21
plies in such area regarding matters for which 22
there is no applicable Federal law, then an ac-23
tion for civil liability described in subsection 24
(a), (b), or (c) that in such area arises under 25
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the law of the State is subject to subsections 1
(a) through (f) in lieu of any related State law 2
that would apply in such area in the absence of 3
this subparagraph. 4
‘‘(g) F
EDERALJURISDICTION.— 5
‘‘(1) In any civil action arising under State law, 6
the courts of the State involved have jurisdiction to 7
apply the provisions of this section. 8
‘‘(2) The actual, asserted, or potential applica-9
tion of any provision of this section in any civil ac-10
tion or as to any civil claim shall not establish the 11
original jurisdiction of the Federal courts over such 12
action or claim under section 1331 of title 28, 13
United States Code. 14
‘‘(h) D
EFINITIONS.— 15
‘‘(1) P
ERCEIVED MEDICAL EMERGENCY .—For 16
purposes of this section, the term ‘perceived medical 17
emergency’ means circumstances in which the behav-18
ior of an individual leads a reasonable person to be-19
lieve that the individual is experiencing a life-threat-20
ening medical condition that requires an immediate 21
medical response regarding the heart or other 22
cardiopulmonary functioning of the individual. 23
‘‘(2) O
THER DEFINITIONS.—For purposes of 24
this section: 25
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‘‘(A) The term ‘automated external 1
defibrillator device’ or ‘AED’ means a 2
defibrillator device that— 3
‘‘(i) is commercially distributed in ac-4
cordance with the Federal Food, Drug, 5
and Cosmetic Act; 6
‘‘(ii) is capable of recognizing the 7
presence or absence of ventricular fibrilla-8
tion, and is capable of determining without 9
intervention by the user of the device 10
whether defibrillation should be performed; 11
‘‘(iii) upon determining that 12
defibrillation should be performed, is able 13
to deliver an electrical shock to an indi-14
vidual; and 15
‘‘(iv) in the case of a defibrillator de-16
vice that may be operated in either an 17
automated or a manual mode, is set to op-18
erate in the automated mode. 19
‘‘(B) The term ‘cautionary signage’ means, 20
with respect to an AED, any verbal or non- 21
verbal markings or language purporting to limit 22
use of the AED by members of the general pub-23
lic or to permit use of the AED only by persons 24
with specific skills, qualifications, or training. 25
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‘‘(C)(i) The term ‘harm’ includes physical, 1
nonphysical, economic, and noneconomic losses. 2
‘‘(ii) The term ‘economic loss’ means any 3
pecuniary loss resulting from harm (including 4
the loss of earnings or other benefits related to 5
employment, medical expense loss, replacement 6
services loss, loss due to death, burial costs, and 7
loss of business or employment opportunities) 8
to the extent recovery for such loss is allowed 9
under applicable State law. 10
‘‘(iii) The term ‘noneconomic losses’ means 11
losses for physical and emotional pain, suf-12
fering, inconvenience, physical impairment, 13
mental anguish, disfigurement, loss of enjoy-14
ment of life, loss of society and companionship, 15
loss of consortium (other than loss of domestic 16
service), hedonic damages, injury to reputation 17
and all other nonpecuniary losses of any kind or 18
nature.’’. 19
Æ
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