Revise prohibition on sale or purchase of human body parts under the revised Uniform Anatomical Gift Act.
SB 154 revises Montana’s Revised Uniform Anatomical Gift Act to tighten and clarify the state’s ban on trafficking in human remains. The bill updates statutory definitions related to anatomical gifts, donors, parts, tissue, procurement organizations, and related terms, and it expressly adds a prohibition on the sale or purchase of whole human bodies in addition to the existing prohibition on buying or selling human body parts. It also extends the ban to transactions involving parts for transplantation, therapy, research, education, and the training of search and rescue canines.
The bill keeps in place the exception for reasonable payments tied to legitimate handling costs, such as removal, processing, disposal, preservation, quality control, storage, transportation, or implantation. Violations remain a felony punishable by up to five years in prison, a fine of up to $50,000, or both. The act takes effect immediately upon passage and approval, and it amends sections 72-17-102 and 72-17-302 of the Montana Code Annotated.
SB 154 directly amends Montana’s anatomical gift and body-part sales statutes by broadening the prohibition to include whole human bodies and by refining definitions used in the organ, tissue, and body donation framework. It affects individuals and entities involved in donation, procurement, transplantation, research, education, tissue banking, eye banking, and related medical or commercial handling of human remains. The bill does not change the general allowance for reimbursing legitimate service costs, but it reinforces criminal penalties for prohibited sales.
The bill appears to have received generally favorable but not unanimous support. It passed the Senate and House through multiple readings and concurrence votes, but several votes were relatively close, indicating meaningful opposition or concern. The final legislative history suggests the measure was ultimately accepted as a policy response to concerns about commercialization of human remains and the need to clarify existing law.
The main point of contention appears to have been the scope of the prohibition and whether the bill went too far in regulating transactions involving human remains. Opponents likely focused on the breadth of the new ban on whole-body sales and the inclusion of research, education, and search-and-rescue canine training within the prohibited sale framework, while supporters likely emphasized closing loopholes and preventing commodification. The recorded votes show the bill was not controversial enough to fail, but it drew enough no votes in both chambers to indicate disagreement over how far the state should go in restricting these transactions.