Malpractice suits not to blame for high health care costs

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Published: August 19, 2009 3:00 a.m.

Letter (Web version): Malpractice suits not to blame for health care costs

Sen. Mitch McConnell calls them “junk lawsuits.” Rep Mike Pence calls them “runaway jury awards.” Either way, Republicans pin colossal hopes for health care reform on the bugaboo – tort reform.

Four of 10 medical malpractice cases are groundless, thus dismissed in court. That means six of 10 involve plaintiffs, lives unalterably changed, who deserve an opportunity to be made whole.

According to the Institute of Medicine, between 44,000 and 98,000 Americans die yearly of avoidable errors. Yet fewer than 11,000 were compensated in 2008, down from 15,000 in 1999.

The National Practitioner Data Bank found the average U.S. malpractice payment for 2008 was $326,000, “the smallest on record”– hardly a runaway jury award. Eighty percent of that money went to those with significant permanent injuries such as quadriplegia and brain damage, needing health care the remainder of their lives and having enormous medical expenses. These are junk lawsuits?

Medicare’s administrator told Congress in 2005, that malpractice litigation accounts for only 0.6 percent of U.S. health care costs, and medical liability accounts for less than 1 percent of the country’s health care costs with “the vast majority of victims receiving no compensation whatsoever.”

Recently, Americans for Insurance Reform found that medical malpractice premiums amount to one-half of 1 percent of health care costs and medical malpractice claims, one-fifth of 1 percent of health care costs.

Tort reform, without a public option to compete with for-profit private insurers, is a toothless GOP health care reform component.

JULIA K. GOUVEIA Muncie

Copyright © 2009 The Journal Gazette.