DENVER, CO – New legislation to ensure patients’ continued access to mental healthcare provided by a licensed human professional will go into effect on August 12. HB26-1195 establishes protective measures on AI use in mental and behavioral health care, including prohibiting the use of AI to independently provide therapy to a patient. The law does not hamper licensed professionals’ use of AI for administrative purposes, but requires all clinical treatment and psychotherapy to be administered by a licensed, human provider. The law sets standards in clinical settings, limiting AI use to administrative tasks with oversight by a licensed professional. Providers must disclose AI use for supplementary support, such as recording or transcribing meetings. The legislation prohibits AI chatbots from being marketed to patients as equivalent to a licensed psychotherapist or counselor and bars them from implying patient input is covered by confidentiality protections like HIPAA. In 2025, researchers at Stanford University recommended that Large Language Models (LLMs), which power AI chatbots, “should not replace therapists.”