Dear CJ&D Supporters,
The New York State Medical lobby is calling for limits on patients' rights, even though there is
no insurance crisis in New York State! On Tuesday, May 20th, doctors rallied at sites around
the state. In New York City, survivors of medical malpractice and consumer rights groups
gathered for a counter protest/news conference across the street from the doctors'rally at 60
Centre Street in Manhattan ahead.
Here is some of the more balanced coverage of Tuesday's events.
Article 1: The New York Times, May 21, 2003, Few Doctors At Protests On Insurance In New York
Article 2: New York Newsday, May 21st, 2003, Rx for lawsuit pain?. Ilene Corina of PULSE New York
interviewed.
Activism makes a difference. If survivors hadn't been out there, the New York City story would have
had no balance.
Best regards to all,
Rebecca
Article 1:
The New York Times
May 21, 2003, Wednesday, Late Edition - Final
Few Doctors At Protests On Insurance In New York
By RICHARD PEREZ-PENA
Doctors and their supporters held demonstrations across New York State yesterday, calling for state
and federal legislation to limit lawsuit awards that they contend are driving up health care costs.
The drive to limit civil jury verdicts is an evergreen issue in Albany and Washington,
perennially stalled by Democratic lawmakers and their close allies, the trial lawyers. While there
has been no sign of change in the State Capitol, doctors and their allies have been heartened by
movement on legislation, backed by President Bush, in the Republican-controlled Congress.
But yesterday's events in New York were sparsely attended, and New York doctors have given no
indication of a revolt of the kind staged by doctors in New Jersey, Florida and Nevada, who
have staged work slowdowns and walkouts to protest high malpractice premiums. And while doctors in
some states face what even skeptics concede is a crisis of sharply rising premiums, consumer
advocates and lawyers' groups insist that is not the case nationally or in New York.
About 200 to 250 people, many of them in white lab coats, attended the demonstration on the steps of
the State Supreme Court building on Foley Square in Manhattan. In Albany, 150 people took part in
the protest, but most were not doctors -- rather, they were people who work in medical offices,
construction company managers and others who support lawsuit restrictions. Turnout was lighter
in other upstate cities like Buffalo, where about 20 protesters rallied.
"New York is in chronic crisis when it comes to any sort of liability," Dr. Jeffrey A.
Ribner, president of theMedical Society of the State of New York, said at the Manhattan rally. Dr. Donald
J. Palmisano, president-elect of the American Medical Association, said, "Doctors are
disappearing across the country" because of high premiums and damage awards.
But Blair Horner, legislative director of the New York Public Interest Research Group, a consumer
advocacy group, called the demonstrations "part of a national strategy, coordinated by the A.M.A., to
push the Bush bill" through Congress. "There is no malpractice crisis in New York," he said.
Doctors in New York have long paid higher premiums than most of their counterparts around the
country, but consumer groups say that mostly reflects the generally higher cost of doing
business in the state. Critics contend that high premiums are due primarily to doctors' own
mistakes, and that recent increases around the country have been caused mostly by insurance
companies' investment losses in a weak economy -- a claim challenged by the insurers and doctors.
In New York, increases in insurance premiums must be approved by the State Insurance Department.
While the department has granted increases in some high-risk specialties, it has not allowed a
general increase in malpractice coverage in several years.
Unlike most states, New York actually helps its doctors buy insurance. Doctors have to buy their
own malpractice coverage, up to certain dollar limits, and then can obtain "excess" coverage
through a state-subsidized pool for any damage awards above those limits.
What has raised doctors' costs in the last year, state officials say, is a state law raising the
amount of coverage doctors must buy on their own before they can qualify to buy the state-run
excess coverage. But the state limited the corresponding premium increase to 5 percent.
Evidence from the National Practitioners Data Bank, a program run by the federal Department of
Health and Human Services, is inconclusive.
New York has more malpractice awards, either in court verdicts or out-of-court settlements, than
any other state, but the total number of such awards has remained about the same in the last
decade, both in New York or nationwide, according to the databank. The databank shows steady
increases in the size of malpractice awards over the last decade, but they rose no faster than the
overall cost of medical care.
Newsday (New York)
May 21, 2003Rx for Lawsuit Pain?;
Docs rally for laws setting limits on malpractice awards
By Dawn MacKeen and Roni Rabin. STAFF WRITERS
Under the shade of pine trees at Heckscher Park in Huntington, at least 200 doctors in white coats
gathered to get out a dire message. Unless there's medical malpractice reform, they threatened there
will be fewer obstetricians to deliver babies, fewer qualified individuals becoming physicians
and more patients possibly dying.
They said this despite statistics showing that New York State has no shortage of physicians. The
demonstration was one of 21 yesterday organized by the Medical Society of the State of New York. One
was in Nassau, at Eisenhower Park in East Meadow. Many doctors canceled their afternoon appointments
in order to attend.
They were all calling for the same thing: a $250,000 cap on awards for pain and suffering.
This would not preclude covering the cost of medical expenses.
"Why are we here today?" asked Robert Scher, vice president of the Medical Society of the State of
New York. "To let patients know, they and we, are in difficulty."
In Suffolk, they said, some of the effects are already taking place. Although there has always
been a pattern ofobstetrician-gynecologists dropping the obstetrics part of their practice as
they age, six of the 19 obstetricians in the East End stopped delivering babies or left the practice
because of their inability to afford the premiums, according to Dr. David Kirshy, a radiologist and
treasurer of the Suffolk County Medical Society.
For example, the annual cost of malpractice insurance premiums is $115,431 for ob-gyns in
Nassau and Suffolk; for neurosurgeons, it's $180,343, according to the Medical Society of New
York.
"The crisis in Long Island is a microcosm of what's happening across the nation as
obstetricians are leaving the practice of obstetrics," said Dr. Denise Lester, obstetrician/gynecologist at Good Samaritan
Hospital Medical Center in West Islip. "Anytime there's any problem with the baby, the people will
quickly blame the obstetrician. Even when it's not."
Right now, New York State has the nation's second highest number of physicians per capita, with many
of them concentrated in the New York metropolitan area, according to 2000 data from the American
Medical Association.
During the rally, organizers pointed to the large number of physicians being sued. Indeed, during
the past five years, 60 percent of the obstetricians insured by the Medical Liability
Mutual Insurance Co. were sued; so were 60 percent of orthopedists and 70 percent of neurosurgeons.
While the number of claims has gone up, contrary to what the physicians said, the overall premiums
for 2002-2003 have not increased, according to Don Fager, vice president of Medical Liability Mutual
Insurance Co. The premiums for the upcoming year have not been determined yet, Fager said.
Throughout the one-hour demonstration, little was mentioned of the medical errors that claim between
44,000 and 98,000 lives each year nationwide in the hospital, according to a 1999 report issued by
the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, compiled by a scientific review of
other studies. It's a higher number than those who die of breast cancer, car accidents or AIDS.
But if the $250,000 cap on pain and suffering were the law of the land, families trying to recover
noneconomic damages would have a hard time finding a lawyer to take cases, even if there were gross
negligence, according to The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, which is based in
California.
Ilene Corina, a Wantagh mother whose 3-year-old son, Michael, died 13 years ago after surgery to
remove his tonsils and adenoids, said it is already difficult for families to bring suit
against physicians.
"They talk about 'frivolous lawsuits,'" said Corina, who has founded the organization PULSE, a
support and advocacy organization that aims to reduce medical errors. "Do you know how long it
took me to find a lawyer who would take my case? No lawyers wanted it, because you can't recover
very much for a 3-year-old child."
--
Rebecca Hoffman
Organizing Director
Center for Justice & Democracy
80 Broad St., Suite 1710
New York, N.Y. 10004-3307
Phone: (917) 438-4608
Fax: (212) 764-4298