00                             HOUSE BILL NO. 60                                                                          
01 "An Act relating to the regulation of the transportation of dead bodies."                                               
02 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF ALASKA:                                                                
03    * Section 1.  AS 18.05.040(a) is amended to read:                                                                  
04            (a)  The commissioner shall adopt regulations consistent with existing law for                               
05                 (1)  the definition, reporting, and control of diseases of public health                                
06       significance;                                                                                                     
07                 (2)  cooperation with local boards of health and health officers;                                       
08                 (3)  protection and promotion of the public health and prevention of                                    
09       disability and mortality;                                                                                         
10                 (4)  the transportation of dead bodies, except that the commissioner                                
11       may not require that a dead body be embalmed unless the body is known to carry                                
12       a communicable disease or embalmment is otherwise required for the protection                                 
13       of the public health or for compliance with federal law;                                                      
14                 (5)  carrying out the purposes of this chapter;                                                         
15                 (6)  the conduct of its business and for carrying out the provisions of                                 

01       laws of the United States and the state relating to public health;                                                
02                 (7)  establishing the divisions and local offices and advisory groups                                   
03       necessary or considered expedient to carry out or assist in carrying out a duty or power                          
04       assigned to it;                                                                                                   
05                 (8)  the voluntary certification of laboratories to perform diagnostic,                                 
06       quality control, or enforcement analyses or examinations based on recognized or                                   
07       tentative standards of performance relating to analysis and examination of food to                                
08       include seafood, milk, water, and specimens from human beings submitted by licensed                               
09       physicians and nurses for analysis;                                                                               
10                 (9)  the regulation of quality and purity of commercially compressed                                    
11       oxygen sold for human respiration;                                                                                
12                 (10)  the licensure of midwifery birth centers, except that the                                         
13       commissioner may not require the presence of a physician or nurse midwife at a birth                              
14       resulting from a low risk pregnancy attended by a direct-entry midwife certified in this                          
15       state.