Kentucky Injury Lawyer Blog

A stalwart of the conservative political movement in the United States recently broke ranks with other conservative and tort-reform groups. The conservative CATO Institute has issued a new study that takes the position that caps on medical malpractice damages might harm patients and promote further unsafe medical care. The Institute’s close affiliation with many conservative groups, politicians, and policy positions should give this paper all that much more credibility in insurance defense and medical provider communities who are pushing a tort-reform agenda, including placing caps on damages in medical malpractice cases around the country. For decades, conservative tort-reform groups have pushed the position that “excessive” or “runaway” jury verdicts in medical malpractice cases have all but sounded the death toll for medical providers around the country. Claims that doctors and other medical providers have been put out of business or forced to leave practices in certain states due to high malpractice insurance rates are a common rallying cry seeking sympathy from voters and consumers.

It seems, however, that the CATO Institute has come to the same conclusion that trial lawyers have known for years: caps on damages only harm patients and victims of malpractice, not doctors and hospitals. The American system of trial by jury and the right to seek compensation for harm and damage caused by the negligence of others is the only way to ensure that quality medical care continues to be the norm, not the exception. Placing caps on the amount of damage that victims of malpractice can seek is an outright assault on that fundamental right. Fortunately, it seems that the CATO Institute agrees. Hopefully, so-called tort-reformers will carefully review the well thought out evidence and arguments presented by the Institute and embrace the concept that the preservation of our jury trial system will only result in safer and better care for everyday Americans.