Friday, May 20, 2005

because we argue about policy too late at night: tort reform

if you look for 'health care' and then click on 'search' you'll come to a page with quotes from the administration about policy. (my roomie was telling me why she's in favor of tort reform and why the dems are hurting regular people for being against it. love my roomie deeply, but i totally disagreed. and was too tired to debate.)

if you scroll down to the 9/4/2003 quote, click on the reference for the CBO report.

the money quote:

"The percentage effect of H.R. 4600 on overall health insurance premiums would be far smaller than the percentage impact on medical malpractice insurance premiums. Malpractice costs account for a very small fraction of total health care spending; even a very large reduction in malpractice costs would have a relatively small effect on total health plan premiums. In addition, some of the savings leading to lower medical malpractice premiums--those savings arising from changes in the treatment of collateral-source benefits--would represent a shift in costs from medical malpractice insurance to health insurance. Because providers of collateral-source benefits would be prevented from recovering their costs arising from the malpractice injury, some of the costs that would be borne by malpractice insurance under current law would instead be borne by the providers of collateral-source benefits. Most such providers are health insurers." [emphasis mine]

so. are outrageous malpractice suits damaging the country and ruining ordinary people and small businesses? i don't think so. neither does the congressional budget office.

love you!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am against lawsuit abuse in all forms. Abuse being the key word. Non-economic damages (aka 'pain and suffering) are precisely what I'm against.

Tort reform covers not only medical and judicial malpractice, but frivolous lawsuits against small businesses. Over the past 3 years, malpractice suits over 2 million dollars have jumped 60%. (ABA study released last month published these findings in Legal Times)--these are just suits against LAWYERS.

Rates are increasing. Period.

The US General Accounting Office(GAO) studied insurance companies and healthcare providers' responses to rising costs of malpractice premiums, and concluded that they have contributed to reduced access to healthcare services. It is also clear that premiums in states in which tort reform and caps on non-economic damages have not risen at the same rates as states with no caps. 10 percent increase of premium costs versus 29 percent in states without limits. Note that they were looking at GP and OBGYN docs specifically. That is insane. 19 percent difference in rates! An OBGYN in middle america Washington state cannot afford this.

Doctors are leaving states without caps and moving to states with caps. Fact. This is not a mass movement, no, it is not an epidemic, it's not a 'liability crisis' as the AMA claims, but each year if every state lost even 1.5 % of their doctors, in five years a state's HC system would be adversely affected.

My only point: There should be a cap. People's greed is out of control and our services are suffering.

I am surprised by the lack of vision here in seeing the big picture. To avoid accountability as Democrats is insipid--healthcare companies, pharma companies are not one large conglomerate Galactic Empire Death Star that the Republicans built. WE BUILT THIS SYSTEM. We INVENTED it, for god's sake. We need to suck it up and fix it and stop blaming others for the problems. Imbalanced rewards for pain and suffering are not helping the community.

Using a liberal BLOG as the basis of your argument instead of thoughtfully forming your own based on life experience and a curiosity about each side of the situation is no different than a conservative spewing out numbers they found on Drudge Report soley to support their argument, paying no heed to the context in which it was written.

Shit happens. People need to suck it up, get their economic lifetime damages, and leave 'punitive damages' to God. Pain and suffering, MY ASS.

references that may be helpful to your readers who would like to form their own opinion:

www.ama-assn.org
www.gao.gov
www.ahca.org
www.law.com

Delia Christina said...

one, the COB document in full pretty much says that tort reform, while there are merits, will not affect insurance premiums in any significant way. if your goal is to affect insurance premiums and protect small businesses, tort reform in the way of capping lawsuits isn't the way. you're totally mixing up two different issues and solutions.

(and, by the way, the COB report is a republican document so stuff it. 'balance' is bullshit.)

Anonymous said...

Tort reform is a key component in the overall strategy of closing loopholes and bringing back sanity to the situation. (See insane Detroit DJ who just sued for getting sick from perfume--Detroit business news).

The COB report confirms that though individual HC premiums are not affected, malpractice premiums ARE. This is hurting the doctors as well as the overall access to HC. It's all connected in the circle of life. One may not affect the other directly, but in the big picture, we gonna be bitten in the ass.

In order for the Dems to win, we need to start digging into facts, own up to fuck ups and energize ourselves around the quest for truth. *sniff*

i'm not weepy. my nose is running.

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