In Ohio, a young girl died after a pharmacy technician included a deadly amount of salt in a prescription. According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the technician told the pharmacist "something was wrong with the mixture, but he approved it anyway."

The pharmacist has, as you might expect, been disbarred, and faces criminal charges.

The Ohio Legislature is considering a bill that "would require that Ohio pharmacy technicians pass a competency test as well as a criminal background check."

Naturally, the legislation is known as "Emily's Bill," after the name of the girl who is forever two years old.

Reading about this story, I thought of two items. One, someone--I think it was Walter E. Williams, but perhaps it was P.J. O'Rourke--said that whenever you have the name of a person in a law, that's usually a sign that it's a bad law, created in the passion of a moment.

The passion part is certainly understandable. Now the other thought that came to me is this: is it a bad law?

The assumption behind the bill is that had it been in place, the girl would not have died. Perhaps. Yet it seems that the ultimate responsibility should go to the pharmacist, who should have investigated the query of his employee.

The result of any licensing, certification or registration requirement applied to an occupation is to restrict the number of people in that occupation. So it could be that the law will mean one less technician here or there, which could in another freak situation lead to another death.

An earlier article mentioned some possible complications with requiring certification. I should also note that thousands of people die each year through medical errors--presumably at the hands of nurses and doctors, occupations that are very much regulated.