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| The Citizens Voice | |
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| Before voting on caps, get all the facts
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| The Senate should be cautious about giving up legal rights. This week, the state Senate will vote on a bill that would put a cap on "pain and suffering" damages that juries can award to victims of medical malpractice. But senators may not be armed with all the information they need to make such an important decision. According to a report released last month from Mercyhurst College, Erie County, "there is an extraordinary lack of credible information necessary to make an informed public policy decision" on the issue of medical malpractice caps. After a six-month study, a bipartisan legislative research committee of five physicians and five lawyers was unable to determine the validity of claims that jury verdicts have caused insurance companies to raise their rates, thus forcing doctors to leave the state. The problem is that nobody has ever tracked specific data, and the information that's available is "unreliable." The report also found that "there is little regulation of the medical malpractice insurance industry in Pennsylvania as compared to other areas of casualty insurance (i.e., homeowners, car insurance), which have underwriting and rate structures that are highly regulated." There is clearly a medical malpractice insurance crisis in Pennsylvania that is affecting the availability of care. The committee determined that physicians have had to pay a minimum of 94 percent more for insurance since 1997. But it remains unclear why the companies hiked their rates to such an extreme. Only a small number of malpractice cases actually make it to trial, and the majority of those are resolved favorably to the defendants. Placing a limit on non-economic damages in these rare circumstances would restrict the right of every Pennsylvanian to have a jury of his or her peers determine fair and just compensation. Before our state legislators consider taking the drastic step of limiting the legal rights of its citizens, it should have all the facts.
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| ŠThe Citizens Voice 2004 |