TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Should a trip to the doctor for a checkup include a question about whether you own a gun? Florida can start enforcing a ban on those questions shortly.
Groups challenging the law say doctors can still ask about gun ownership as they continue to go through the appeals process.
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Pediatrician Louis St. Petery said the first funeral that he attended in Tallahassee was for a child who shot himself by accident with a parent's handgun.
"That was a shocking thing for us at that point in time, for my wife and me, and one of the reasons that I'm pretty passionate about the fact this needs to be done correctly," St. Petery said.
St. Petery and the American Academy of Pediatrics have been fighting against a law for the past four years that would prevent doctors from asking patients about gun ownership.
The commonly called "Docs vs. Glocks" law pits the First Amendment against the Second Amendment. An appeals court lifted the injunction on the law earlier this week
National Rifle Association lobbyist Marion Hammer said questioning patients about guns is outside the scope of a doctor's work.
"When you take a child to a pediatrician for medical care, you're not taking them there to have a doctor talk to you about their political agendas with regard to firearms," Hammer said.
Opponents of the law argue that it's no different than talking to parents about poison control.
The American Civil Liberties Union bashed the court's decision.
"This is a free speech restriction, but it's a free speech restriction that also could be very, very dangerous for the children of the state of Florida," ACLU Executive Director Howard Simon said.
The law could take effect in about a month pending any further appeals.