New Jersey A 2668: Requires screening of certain high-risk pregnancies and reporting of fetal deaths.

Bill Text

A2668 

ASSEMBLY, No. 2668 

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

222nd LEGISLATURE

� 

PRE-FILED FOR INTRODUCTION IN THE 2026 SESSION

Sponsored by:

Assemblyman CHRISTOPHER P. DEPHILLIPS

District 40 (Bergen, Essex and Passaic)

SYNOPSIS

���� Requires screening of certain high-risk pregnancies 
and reporting of fetal deaths.

CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT 

���� Introduced Pending Technical Review by Legislative 
Counsel.

�� 

An Act concerning high-risk pregnancies, amending 
R.S.26:8-4, and supplementing P.L.1968, c.413 (C.30:4D-1 et seq.).

���� Be It 
Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of 
the State of New Jersey:

���� 1.��� R.S.26:8-4 is amended to 
read as follows: 

���� 26:8-4.� Duty to furnish 
information relative to birth, death, marriage, civil union, domestic 
partnership.� Upon demand of the State registrar in person, by mail, by means 
of the NJ-EDRS, or through the local registrar, every physician, midwife, 
informant, funeral director, or other person having knowledge of the facts 
relative to any birth, death, fetal death, marriage, civil union or domestic 
partnership, shall supply such information as he may possess, upon a form 
provided by the State registrar, or through the NJ-EDRS, or upon the original 
birth, death, fetal death, marriage, civil union or domestic partnership 
certificate or its electronic facsimile or digitized form thereof.� In the 
case of a fetal death occurring 20 or more weeks after gestation, the 
particulars of that death shall be entered into a State electronic birth 
certificate and perinatal database. 

(cf: P.L.2006, c.103, s.38)

���� 2.��� (New section)� A health 
care professional, when providing prenatal care to a patient or care to a 
newborn patient in a federally qualified health center or other community 
health center, shall apply the criteria contained in the most recent edition of 
the Guidelines for Perinatal Care developed by the American Academy of 
Pediatrics and the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to 
determine which high-risk conditions require that a patient be referred to a 
perinatologist, and shall refer that patient to a perinatologist if the 
criteria are met. 

���� 3.��� Pursuant to the 
�Administrative Procedure Act,� P.L.1968, c.410 (C.52:14B-1 et seq.), the 
Commissioner of Health shall adopt rules and regulations to effectuate the 
purposes of R.S.26:8-4 as amended by P.L.��� , c.�� (pending before the 
Legislature as this bill),� and the Commissioner of Human Services shall adopt 
rules and regulations to effectuate the purposes of section 2 of 
P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending 
before the Legislature as this bill).

���� 4.��� This act shall take 
effect on the first day of the sixth month next following the date of 
enactment, but the Commissioners of Health and Human Services may take such 
anticipatory administrative action in advance thereof as shall be necessary for 
the implementation of this act.

STATEMENT

���� This bill requires that 
various actions be taken during the perinatal period, which is from the 20th 
week of gestation through the 28th day after birth, in order to improve birth 
outcomes and protect the health of low-income expectant mothers who may be at 
risk for complications.

���� Specifically, the bill amends 
R.S.26:8-4, which currently requires reporting of births and deaths (including 
fetal deaths) to the State registrar, to require that fetal deaths occurring 20 
or more weeks after gestation also be reported to a State electronic birth 
certificate and perinatal database.� In addition, the bill requires that health 
care professionals in clinics providing prenatal care to patients and care to 
newborns apply the criteria contained in the most recent edition of the 
Guidelines for Perinatal Care, developed by the American Academy of Pediatrics 
and the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to determine 
which high-risk conditions require referral to a perinatologist, which is a 
specialist in the care of mothers and fetuses at higher-than-normal risk for 
complications.