Nik Rajkovic / news@whmi.com

One year after a 5-year-old boy was killed in a hyperbaric chamber explosion at the Oxford Center in Troy, Michigan lawmakers are introducing legislation to regulate the industry.

State Rep. Sharon MacDonell, D-Troy, represents the district where the deadly explosion happened. She posted on social media this week:

"Bipartisan legislation to license and regulate freestanding providers of hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I have worked with doctors, hyperbaric professionals, hospitals, and researchers to craft legislation that improves oversight of these facilities while preserving patient access. More than a year has passed since the tragic death of a young boy in a hyperbaric chamber in Troy. As more Michiganders seek out this therapy, we must do everything we can to ensure patient safety in these facilities."

Michigan would become the first state in the nation to require licensure, inspections and accreditation of stand-alone health and wellness centers, medical spas and other facilities that use hyperbaric oxygen chambers — if a package of bills introduced this week in the state House of Representatives and Senate is signed into law.

The legislation has bipartisan support and would require the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs to license and inspect free-standing facilities, MacDonell said.

Oxford Center CEO Tamela Peterson and three employees are criminally charged in Thomas Cooper's death and await trial in Oakland County Circuit Court.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel described the business as "unscrupulous" when she charged them in March 2025, saying that Oxford Center disregarded safety measures for years, using the highly pressurized oxygen chambers “over and over again to provide unaccredited and debunked so-called treatments, chiefly because it brought cash into the door.”

All four have pleaded not guilty.