Americans should look at Insurance Reform Before Espousing Tort Reform
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There is a lot of energy about the various Health Care Bills that are being prepared and proposed by Congress. One issue on lots of minds is tort reform. Some elected officials are for tort reform, but those are the same politicians that accept big checks from insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies and corporations who have a vested interest in "reform" (i.e. elimination of access to court by victims of medical negligence).
Sadly, the tort reformist politicians who have an agenda separate and apart from protecting their own constituencies, are propped up by Fox News and other "journalists". But the reporters are not being completely honest with the public. Either that or they simply don't do their homework and research the issue. Either option is irresponsible because the American public is actually buying into what is being reported. Now there is an entire group of tort reform supporters, which based on the information they believe to be accurate, are claiming tort reform is necessary in order to drastically reduce the cost of healthcare for Americans. “Enacting a typical set of proposals would reduce federal budget deficits by roughly $54 billion over the next 10 years,” wrote Congressional Budget Office Director Doug Elmendorf in his blog.
Others, like former Democratic Sen. Bill Bradley, have said that tort reform should be bundled with a healthcare package to attractRepublican support for universal coverage. But while lowering costs may sound nice, it’s not reality. And in the case of Bradley, nobody wins with a pork-laden bill.
“Liability isn’t even the tail on the cost dog. It’s the hair on the end of the tail,” Tom Baker, a professor of law and health sciences at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law, told the New York Times in a recent interview.
Baker said medical malpractice tort costs in 2007 were $30.4 billion out of a more than a $2 trillion health care system, meaning litigation costs and malpractice insurance constituted about 1 to 1.5 percent of total medical costs. In fact, he argued that since there have been about the same number of claims today as 20 years ago, the cost of health care has doubled in that time frame, the number of medical encounters between doctors and patients has gone up and research shows a more or less constant rate of errors per hospitalizations, there actually is a declining rate of lawsuits relative to numbers of injuries.
But medical costs still have skyrocketed. Baker says to consider that the American population is aging, we’ve had expensive advances in technology, the US is a rich nation, and the richer you get, the more money you spend on health care, and compared to other countries, the US has heavy administrative costs from the private-insurance system.
And in some parts of the country, notably Florida, doctors aren’t even required to carry insurance. Interestingly, Florida doctors are doing some of the loudest complaining, but a considerable number of them,particularly ones who perform surgery, don't pay a single dollar in premiums. A state physician database showed that one in eight doctors statewide in Florida opt out of malpractice insurance under a state law that lets them go without coverage. The law says doctors can go uninsured if they post signs in their offices and promise to pay up to $250,000 per malpractice award, with a maximum of $750,000 per year.
This policy has negative consequences. First, the patient is left with little discourse in the case of legitimate medical malpractice. Second, the insurance companies raise premiums to make up for all the doctors who aren’t insured. According to the South Florida. More responsible reporting, such as the Sun-Sentinel, has disclosed that premiums since 2003 have gone down yearly by less than 10 percent as insurer profits climbed to an average of 20 percent in 2006.
Instead of focusing energy on tort reform, the focus would be better on reducing premiums and reforming insurance companies. And there is no doubt that uninsured doctors should not be allowed to practice. Period. Anywhere. Unless of course they will agree to submit that all acquisitions in their name, their wife's or husband's name, and the companies created as shell corporations are jointly and several liable for monies awarded by a jury in a negligence case.
In the cases where those doctors who are uninsured . That starts with helping insure doctors are compensated in a way they deem fair, which includes making premiums affordable. And should someone be injured through negligence, and there not be either assets or insurance to recover from, unless that person is independently wealthy, guess who pays for the ongoing needs and medical care they require going forward? That's right- the taxpayers.
Medical malpractice litigation isn’t the problem; it’s time to focus on some solutions.