Senate Approves Bill Giving Immunity to 911 Dispatchers

A bill to allow 911 operators and other emergency dispatchers to give life-and-death medical advice over the telephone easily won passage Friday in the state Senate. The vote was 32 to 1.

The measure, which is being pushed by the California State Firefighters’ Assn., now goes to the Assembly, where its prospects for passage are regarded as good.

If passed into law, it would provide limited immunity from civil suits to emergency dispatchers who give cardiopulmonary resuscitation and childbirth instructions as well as other emergency medical advice over the telephone.

According to the firefighters association, most local governments in California have gag rules on their emergency dispatchers. The rules forbid them to give medical information over the telephone for fear of lawsuits. Los Angeles city and county fire departments, by contrast, allow their emergency dispatchers to give such advice as long as they follow written information cards about medical situations.

A tragedy in Northern California last summer intensified longstanding efforts by the firefighters to have legislation passed to help emergency dispatchers.

Eldon Nagel, general manager of the Sacramento-based firefighters group, said a 1-year-old baby may have needlessly died last July because an emergency dispatcher in a rural Northern California county would not give CPR instructions to the child’s mother over the telephone. County rules prohibited him from doing so.

In that incident, the baby fell into a bucket of water and became unconscious. The mother dialed the 911 number and asked the dispatcher for CPR advice. The dispatcher declined to give help and the baby died.

The firefighters association has declined to identify the county involved in the fatal incident.

Passage of the so-called 911 bill came Friday without debate. The lone negative vote was cast by Sen. Bill Leonard (R-Big Bear), who said cities and counties “on their own” could pass laws affecting emergency dispatchers.