City of Revere v. Massachusetts General Hospital: government responsibility for an arrestee's medical care.

Publisher: Cambridge University Press Country of Publication: England NLM ID: 7509572 Publication Model: Print Cited Medium: Print ISSN: 0098-8588 (Print) Linking ISSN: 00988588 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Am J Law Med Subsets: MEDLINE

Publication: 2021- : [Cambridge] : Cambridge University Press
Original Publication: Boston : American Society of Law & Medicine

Prisoners* ; Social Responsibility*; Delivery of Health Care/*legislation & jurisprudence ; Fees, Medical/*legislation & jurisprudence; Humans ; Male ; Massachusetts ; Patient Advocacy/legislation & jurisprudence

City of Revere v. Massachusetts General Hospital presented the United States Supreme Court with its first opportunity to consider whether a state or municipality has a constitutional duty to pay for medical treatment received by an individual in police custody. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts had held that the city had an eighth amendment duty to pay for an arrestee's treatment. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed, observing that eighth amendment rights and duties are not implicated prior to conviction and that fourteenth amendment due process concerns were met once the arrestee received adequate medical care. No obligation to pay arises, the Court held, absent a specific state law provision requiring such payment. Because arrestees are subject to physical restraints similar to those imposed on convicted prisoners, this Case Comment argues that courts undertaking to determine the scope of a state's duty to provide treatment to arrestees should apply a due process standard which draws upon eighth amendment analysis. The Comment concludes that under such an eighth amendment equivalence approach, no duty to pay arises because the state's failure to pay the health care provider does not reflect "deliberate indifference" towards the recipient of the treatment.

Date Created: 19830101 Date Completed: 19840611 Latest Revision: 20041117

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