With their phony claims of doctors fleeing the state in droves, Pennsylvania physicians have given new meaning to the term WMD - Web of Mass Deception.

In 2002, doctors began threatening to leave the state because of rising malpractice insurance costs. They warned of a looming health-care "crisis" due to a shortage of doctors. For two years, they repeatedly told legislators, the media and public that hundreds of doctors - as many as 1,700 by some estimates - had fled the state for more favorable places to practice. They did so hoping they could scare people into giving up their rights before the truth came out.

Well, the jig is up.

Figures recently released by the state Insurance Department show that not only are the doctors' claims false, the opposite is actually true - that there are over 1,700 more physicians in Pennsylvania than there were in 2002. Other statistics, including the number of medical licenses issued by the state, also have shown steady increases in the number of doctors in recent years. Now, legislators in Harrisburg are calling for an investigation into physicians' claims of a mass exodus. It's about time.

It's about time our elected officials got to the bottom of what's really causing doctors' insurance premiums to go up. It's about time politicians in Harrisburg and Washington started looking at regulating the insurance industry and making sure patients don't get injured by preventable medical mistakes. It's about time the media stopped buying into the phony propaganda of the medical lobby.

And it's about time the public saw the "doctor exodus" for what it really is - a political scare tactic aimed at taking away our rights.

Joseph Piechot
Scranton