There has been a lot of talk at the federal level about creating a limit to liability law for those essential businesses that had to operate over the timeline of the Covid-19 pandemic while knowledge of the virus was becoming better and better every day.  The thought process has been that businesses should not be held liable as they tried to do right with limited knowledge of the virus behavior.

While the federal level has not been able to do this, many states are now in the process of passing laws to limit liabilities of essential services, including funeral homes.  The latest to do so was the State of Kentucky just last week.  The law passed both Republican held houses and then was allowed to become law when Kentucky Democrat Governor Andy Beshear let the veto or signage time pass which, by Kentucky law, allowed the bill to become law last Sunday.

Here’s an article from Bloomberg Law on the Kentucky law.

You can check on how your state is coming with this type of legislation here.  This state update was last updated on March 18,2021.

Finally, you can read this article from the Maryland State Bar Association entitled, “Responsibility for COVID-19 liability shield laws shifts to states”.  Here is an excerpt from that article:

” The (federal) SAFE TO WORK Act became a casualty of negotiations for the second stimulus package enacted in December 2020. Congressional Democrats were opposed to the SAFE TO WORK Act, at least as written.  According to some reporting, Republicans were willing to forego near term liability protection in order to get a second relief package passed, and because states had already entered the field.” 

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