We stumbled upon this interview with Ken Suggs, president of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America, who says the malpractice crisis is more about politics than a real crisis. Read it here.
Below, some choice quotes:
"It keeps coming back on a national level because Senator (Bill) Frist wants to run for president and this is a way for him to raise money."
"If you look at payouts in medical malpractice cases, which (consumer advocacy group) Public Citizen did last year, payouts have remained flat for more than 10 years, and over the last four years have been dropping."
"The only places where people have trouble finding an OBGYN to do any procedure are in rural, poverty-stricken areas, where the OBGYNs don't want to live and practice."
"The person who is hurt, who has had their life changed for the much worse, certainly don't they deserve some kind of compensation for putting up with that? Or are we just going to say, "No, all we care about is economics and insurance premiums and making insurance executives rich, so that (injured) person is just going to have to suck it up." That's not the American way. The American way is to make the person who did the harm responsible for all of the harm, not just part of the harm."
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