Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 76.djvu/584

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PUBLIC LAW 87-656-SEPT. 10, 1962

[76 STAT.

(c) A provision in any will, codicil, or written statement which donates tissue as provided by this Act shall become effective immediately upon the death of the testator or donor, and shall constitute the authority for any physician or hospital validly operating a tissue bank to remove said tissue. SEC. 7. TISSUE DONATIONS BY THOSE HAVING RIGHT TO BODY.—Any

person having the right to a body for the purpose of burial may by a AVritten statement donate any tissue from such.body to any tissue bank, and in such written statement may designate the purpose or purposes for which such tissue is to be used. Such writing shall constitute full authority for the tissue bank to use such tissue for the purposes of this Act. SEC. 8. PERSONS ENTITLED IX> THE BODY.—For the purposes of this Act, the order of priority in which persons are entitled to the body for burial and who may donate tissue therefrom shall be the following: (a) The surviving spouse. (b) If there be no surviving spouse, or if the surviving spouse is incompetent, unavailable, or does not claim the body for burial, then an adult child, a parent, an adult brother, or an adult sister of the decedent. Any one of such persons may make such donation: Provided, That tissue shall not be removed pursuant to a donation made by any one of such persons designated in this subsection if, before such tissue is removed, any one of such persons shall, in writing, notify the tissue bank which is to remove the tissue that he objects to such removal. (c) Any person whom the deceased during his lifetime designated by written instrument to take charge of his body for burial. (d) The person or agency who or which assumes custody of the body for burial, in any case in which the person designated as provided in paragraph (c) or all of the persons mentioned in paragraph (a) or (b) of this section have failed to claim the body. SEC. 9. OFFICE OF THE CORONER.— (a)

Post, p- «4 3.

The

Commissioners

are

authorized to appoint such number of licensed physicians as they deem appropriate to~ perform such of the functions of the Coroner of the District of Columbia as the Commissioners shall prescribe. The Commissioners are authorized to fix the compensation of such physicians at a rate or rates not in excess of the per diem equivalent of the maximum rate for grade 18 of the General Schedule of the Classification Act of 1949, as amended. The Commissioners are further authorized, in their discretion, to accept the services of such physicians without compensation. (b) The Coroner of the District of Columbia may, in his discretion, allow tissue to be removed from any dead human body in his custody or under his jurisdiction: Provided, That such tissue removal shall not interfere with other functions of the Office of the Coroner: Provided further, That the person who, in accordance with section 8 of this Act, is entitled to the body for burial, shall first authorize such tissue removal. SEC. 10. MOVEMENT AND DISPOSITION OF TISSUE BY TISSUE B A N K S. —

Sections 675 and 676 of the Act entitled "An Act to establish a code of laws for the District of Columbia", approved March 3, 1901 (31 Stat. 1296), as amended by the first section of the Act approved September 22, 1950 (64 Stat. 904; sec. 27-119a, D.C. Code, 1951 ed.), are amended (a) by striking, in the first sentence of such sections, the

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