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Committee backs bill extending safe-surrender window to 45 days to allow more time for confidential infant relinquishment
Summary
House Bill 386 would increase the age at which a parent can relinquish an unharmed newborn without criminal liability from 14 days to 45 days; the committee approved the bill and sponsors said medical professionals will still assess a child’s age when necessary.
The House Health Full Committee advanced House Bill 386, which would extend Tennessee’s safe-surrender window for unharmed newborns from 14 days to 45 days.
Sponsor Representative Butler said the extension would “provide more flexibility for the mother to determine whether she feels she is capable of being a parent” and allow stressed mothers more time to make a confidential choice to hand a newborn to an appropriate facility or person. He noted several other states have longer windows ranging up to a year in isolated examples.
Committee members raised concerns about how age determinations would be made for infants presented to emergency rooms and about the potential for the timeframe to be misused by prosecuting authorities. The sponsor said current law already requires the medical professional at the receiving facility to assess a child’s apparent age and that the committee could consider a longer window (for example, 90 days) if members preferred.
The committee voted to advance the bill on a unanimous voice vote recorded as 22 ayes, 0 nos. The measure moves to finance, ways and means.
