The Transparency in Healthcare bill cleared a major hurdle Thursday when the Florida Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Health and Human Services passed the legislation.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Rob Bradley (R-FlemingIsland), comes after Gov. Rick Scott has spent months accusing Florida hospitals of engaging in price gouging — an allegation many hospitals have refuted.
If passed, the transparency legislation would establish a penalty system for hospitals that engage in price gouging and require hospitals to provide itemized billing receipts, among others things.
"Patients in need of medical treatment deserve to know how much they should reasonably expect to pay for particular services," Senate President Andy Gardiner (R-Orlando) told Sunshine State News. "This bill will make that information more readily available and also includes penalties for those entities who would charge unconscionable prices to Floridians in need of medical attention."