S.B. 235 Prohibits Forced Microchip Implants

Radio Commentary, WMVV 90.7 New Life FM, April 16, 2010
By Sue Ella Deadwyler

Good morning, Jim. Last Tuesday the House Judiciary Committee had a hearing on S.B. 235, the latest bill to prohibit forced microchip implants. Few people might believe it’s possible to insert a tiny device into a human body and track the person’s every move, while monitoring conditions in the body. But reality has caught up with science fiction and legislators have a big decision to make. Will they respect our constitutional right to be secure in our own persons or will they decide government has a right to monitor and control our every move?

Last Tuesday the House Judiciary Committee was faced with just such a dilemma when they heard testimony about S.B. 235 to protect the population from being implanted with a microchip against their will. In the last four years, four other states have passed laws prohibiting forced implants, but in those same years, Georgia legislators have refused to do so.

The right to decide what happens to our own bodies is uppermost in this debate, but the medical issue is important, too. Researchers studying microchip effects on laboratory animals learned that microchips in animals have caused cancer and infections and don’t always stay where they’re put. They drift in the body and some were found in animals’ limbs or abdomens or heads. Meaning, a microchip in the human body could be a serious health hazard. After reading the research, a lead doctor at New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center said: “There’s no way in the world, having read this information, that I would have one of those chips implanted in my skin, or in one of my family members. Given the preliminary animal data, it looks to me that there’s definitely cause for concern.”

Already on the market for use in humans is a three-part surveillance system containing a radio signal microchip, a sensor and a reader. It detects viruses and infections in the human body and transmits biologic and geographic data to a reader that tracks the person in real time 24 hours a day. S.B. 235 would prohibit anyone from forcing another person to submit to a microchip implant. It passed the Judiciary Committee last Tuesday, but has a long way to go in these last four days of the session. Please call House Rules Committee chairman Hembree at 404 656-5141* and ask that S.B. 235 pass onto the House floor for a vote. It’s been in the works for three years and the longer they wait, the less likely it is to pass. For Georgia Insight I’m Sue Ella Deadwyler, your Capitol correspondent.