History

Constitutional and remedial baseline

Before adoption of Florida’s 1968 Constitution, Florida law already provided a survival remedy and a separate wrongful-death remedy. Former section 46.021 preserved causes of action after the death of the person entitled or liable, subject to the law then in force. That preconstitutional baseline matters under Kluger v. White and when identifying what the 1972 Act later eliminated, consolidated, or substituted. Inspect the 1967 source record.

The modern Wrongful Death Act

Chapter 72-35 declared a policy of shifting wrongful-death losses from survivors to the wrongdoer. Section 768.20 required the personal representative to bring one action for the survivors and estate. When a personal injury resulted in death, the decedent’s personal-injury action did not survive and any pending action abated; the wrongful-death cause of action accrued on the date of death. Section 768.21 then defined the recoverable survivor and estate losses.

The Act’s limiting language must be retained where it changes the measure of a particular damage category. That statutory wording is distinct from Martin’s later phrase “constitutional to the extent that,” which limited the scope of the Court’s constitutional holding.

Kluger v. White

The Florida Supreme Court held that when a right of access for a particular injury existed under pre-1968 statutory or common law, the Legislature may not abolish it without providing a reasonable alternative. Without such an alternative, abolition requires an overpowering public necessity and a showing that no alternative method can meet that necessity. Read the source record and direct opinion.

From limitation and discovery to limitation and repose

Before the February 1975 special act, the malpractice framework generally supplied a four-year limitations period, while Florida decisions addressed when an injury or cause of action was discovered and when fraudulent concealment could toll the running of limitations. Chapter 75-9 replaced that framework with a two-year period running from the incident or from discovery, or when discovery should have occurred through due diligence, and an outside four-year boundary measured from the incident.

For actions in which fraud, concealment, or intentional misrepresentation prevented discovery within four years, the 1975 text extended the period two years from actual or constructive discovery, but in no event beyond seven years from the incident. The four- and seven-year boundaries operated as repose because a claim could be barred even though discovery occurred later.

The Legislature enacted Chapter 75-9 amid its stated premises that professional-liability premiums had risen sharply, patients would ultimately bear the cost, physicians might curtail practice or retire, and defensive medicine would increase costs. Those are documented legislative assertions; this timeline does not treat every asserted crisis premise as an independently established or permanently continuing empirical fact. The enactment also included insurance, screening, disciplinary, and study measures, not repose alone. Continue to the repose research materials.

Martin v. United Security Services

Martin held sections 768.16–768.27 constitutional “to the extent that” they consolidated survival and wrongful-death actions and substituted survivors’ pain and suffering for the decedent’s pain and suffering. The Court described the substituted survivor remedy as a reasonable alternative to the recovery formerly available for the decedent’s pain and suffering.

Carr v. Broward County

Carr upheld application of medical-malpractice repose under Article I, section 21. The Court accepted the announced public necessity, agreed that no less stringent measure would address the identified problem, and considered seven years an objectively reasonable period in which fraud-related claims must be discovered. Three justices dissented on the ground that applying repose under the circumstances denied access to courts.

Chapter 90-14 and subsection 768.21(8)

Chapter 90-14, enacted from CS/SB 324, expanded specified recovery rather than merely changing a definition. When no spouse survives, section 768.21(3) allowed all children, not only minor children, to recover lost parental companionship, instruction, guidance, and mental pain and suffering. The enactment also expanded qualifying parental recovery under subsection (4). In the same act, new subsection (8) withheld the damages specified in subsections (3) and (4) from adult children and parents of adult children when the claim is based on medical negligence. CS/HB 709 was the House companion.

The reviewed bill analyses and recordings document the expansion and medical-negligence exclusion, but no developed discussion has been located connecting the exclusion to all parts of the existing remedial structure: the 1972 substitution, section 768.20’s representative action and abatement rule, and Martin’s constitutional explanation. The documentary-history article distinguishes that documented silence from any inference about what individual legislators privately knew.

Mizrahi v. North Miami Medical Center

Mizrahi upheld subsection (8) against the equal-protection question presented under rational-basis review, relying on the asserted relationship among limiting liability, malpractice-insurance costs, and access to health care. It remains controlling precedent unless a court with authority distinguishes or displaces it.

Estate of McCall v. United States

McCall invalidated aggregate medical-malpractice wrongful-death noneconomic-damage caps under equal protection. The separate opinions scrutinized the evidentiary basis and continued existence of the asserted crisis. McCall did not itself invalidate subsection 768.21(8).

North Broward Hospital District v. Kalitan

Kalitan applied McCall’s equal-protection reasoning and invalidated the challenged personal-injury medical-malpractice caps. It did not itself decide subsection 768.21(8).

Santiago v. Rodriguez

Santiago recognized that the Second District remained bound by Mizrahi while certifying whether subsection (8) violated equal protection after McCall and Kalitan. The Florida Supreme Court accepted jurisdiction, but the proceeding was voluntarily dismissed before a merits decision. The certified question therefore was not answered in that proceeding; subsection (8) was neither invalidated nor newly sustained on the merits.

Additional challenges and developing research

In Morenings v. Rivera, a pleading separately requested declaratory relief against subsection (8). A pleaded challenge is not a judicial holding. The project’s statewide court-record review has also sought medical-negligence wrongful-death actions prosecuted solely on the affected class’s remaining economic damages. Because source reconciliation and review continue, this page does not publish a statewide percentage or claim that no such case can exist. See the research materials and confidential attorney practice survey.

Repeal passed and was vetoed

HB 6017 passed the Florida House 104–6 and the Senate 33–4. SB 734 supplied the Senate companion path. Governor Ron DeSantis vetoed HB 6017 on May 29, 2025, leaving subsection (8) in force. Follow the official bill histories and advocacy resources.

Repeal returned but did not become law

HB 6003 died in Senate Rules on March 13, 2026, and identical SB 1700 died in Senate Judiciary. On June 18, 2026, the House transmitted the 2025 veto message to the Secretary of State. No repeal became law, and subsection (8) remains effective.