Something like this...
Posted on 08/21/2009 7:14:29 AM PDT by DogBarkTree
President Obama's health care "reform" plan has met with significant criticism across the country. Many Americans want change and reform in our current health care system. We recognize that while we have the greatest medical care in the world, there are major problems that we must face, especially in terms of reining in costs and allowing care to be affordable for all. However, as we have seen, current plans being pushed by the Democratic leadership represent change that may not be what we had in mind -- change which poses serious ethical concerns over the government having control over our families’ health care decisions. In addition, the current plans greatly increase costs of health care, while doing lip service toward controlling costs.
We need to address a REAL bipartisan reform proposition that will have REAL impacts on costs, and quality of patient care.
As Governor of Alaska, I learned a little bit about being a target for frivolous suits and complaints (Please, do I really need to footnote that?). I went my whole life without needing a lawyer on speed-dial, but all that changes when you become a target for opportunists and people with no scruples. Our nation’s health care providers have been the targets of similar opportunists for years, and they too have found themselves subjected to false, frivolous, and baseless claims. To quote a former president, “I feel your pain.”
So what can we do? First, we cannot have health care reform without tort reform. The two are intertwined. For example, one supposed justification for socialized medicine is the high cost of health care. As Dr. Scott Gottlieb recently noted, “If Mr. Obama is serious about lowering costs, he'll need to reform the economic structures in medicine—especially programs like Medicare.” [1] Two examples of these “economic structures” are high malpractice insurance premiums foisted on physicians (and ultimately passed on to consumers as “high health care costs”) and the billions wasted on defensive medicine.
Dr. Stuart Weinstein, with the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, recently explained the problem:
”The medical liability crisis has had many unintended consequences, most notably a decrease in access to care in a growing number of states and an increase in healthcare costs. Access is affected as physicians move their practices to states with lower liability rates and change their practice patterns to reduce or eliminate high-risk services. When one considers that half of all neurosurgeons—as well as one third of all orthopedic surgeons, one third of all emergency physicians, and one third of all trauma surgeons—are sued each year, is it any wonder that 70 percent of emergency departments are at risk because they lack available on-call specialist coverage?” [2]
Dr. Weinstein makes good points, points completely ignored by President Obama. Dr. Weinstein details the costs that our out-of-control tort system are causing the health care industry and notes research that “found that liability reforms could reduce defensive medicine practices, leading to a 5 percent to 9 percent reduction in medical expenditures without any effect on mortality or medical complications.” Dr. Weinstein writes:
“If the Kessler and McClellan estimates were applied to total U.S. healthcare spending in 2005, the defensive medicine costs would total between $100 billion and $178 billion per year. Add to this the cost of defending malpractice cases, paying compensation, and covering additional administrative costs (a total of $29.4 billion). Thus, the average American family pays an additional $1,700 to $2,000 per year in healthcare costs simply to cover the costs of defensive medicine. Excessive litigation and waste in the nation’s current tort system imposes an estimated yearly tort tax of $9,827 for a family of four and increases healthcare spending in the United States by $124 billion. How does this translate to individuals? The average obstetrician-gynecologist (OB-GYN) delivers 100 babies per year. If that OB-GYN must pay a medical liability premium of $200,000 each year (which is the rate in Florida), $2,000 of the delivery cost for each baby goes to pay the cost of the medical liability premium.” [3]
You would think that any effort to reform our health care system would include tort reform, especially if the stated purpose for Obama’s plan to nationalize our health care industry is the current high costs.
So I have new questions for the president: Why no legal reform? Why continue to encourage defensive medicine that wastes billions of dollars and does nothing for the patients? Do you want healthcare reform to benefit trial attorneys or patients?
Many states, including my own state of Alaska, have enacted caps on lawsuit awards against health care providers. Texas enacted caps and found that one county’s medical malpractice claims dropped 41 percent, and another study found a “55 percent decline” after reform measures were passed. [4] That’s one step in health care reform. Limiting lawyer contingency fees, as is done under the Federal Tort Claims Act, is another step. The State of Alaska pioneered the “loser pays” rule in the United States, which deters frivolous civil law suits by making the loser partially pay the winner’s legal bills. Preventing quack doctors from giving “expert” testimony in court against real doctors is another reform. Texas Gov. Rick Perry noted that, after his state enacted tort reform measures, the number of doctors applying to practice medicine in Texas “skyrocketed by 57 percent” and that the tort reforms “brought critical specialties to underserved areas.” These are real reforms that actually improve access to health care. [5]
Dr. Weinstein’s research shows that around $200 billion per year could be saved with legal reform. That’s real savings. That’s money that could be used to build roads, schools, or hospitals. If you want to save health care, let’s listen to our doctors too. There should be no health care reform without legal reform. There can be no true health care reform without legal reform.
- Sarah Palin
Discussing the specifics of Palin's article is "hate?" My God, man ... that's the sort of tripe one expects from the childish left, not from adults.
You clearly hate her. So I can’t see myself having a reasonable discussion with you until you let go of it.
R9,
Just out of curiousity, are you female and married? The reason I ask is that you are peddling another DBM/liberal misnomer that support for Palin is high because of her looks.
Media attention to her may be high, but if she was out espousing pro-abortion milquetoastianism, she would have little political support, especially here.
No question that Palin’s numbers lag with women because she is attractive, and some women can’t handle other attractive women. I just wonder if that is the angle you are coming from?
She is getting the DEBATE going with REAL ISSUES.
Tort reform...the great big ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM! YOU GO SARAH!
And death panels....ANOTHER GREAT BIG ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM! GO SARAH!!!
And rb, when she discovers a new planet or suddenly grows hair on her chest....you know...something really NEW and GROUND BREAKING....I know you will be the FIRST to stand up and acknowledge it and will become the greatest Sarah Palin fan on FR. I look forward to Sarah coming forth with something never before thought of in the history of political issues within America!
:^)
Sounds like Palin is framing the argument. I hope she takes the opening and runs with it.
Well then, California should be a medical utopia given the limitations imposed by MICRA. Let me assure you it is not. The anecdotes you cite aren’t data. Read Tom Baker’s book on medical malpractice costs, and the actual statistics will confound your argument. There is no real med mal litigation epidemic going on. Only a fraction of patients sue, and a much smaller fraction of plaintiffs win. Most cases are tossed at the MSJ stage, and most verdicts are in the doc’s favor.
A fair catch.
But an overall very good piece where she goes directly after Obama with a point that all other supposed Republican ‘leaders’ have let drop. She is attacking by offering an alternative solution. No need to focus on one (yes, careless) sop to moderates when she’s doing the heavy lifting and firing that no one else on our team is doing.
When EXPENSES are raised because doctors who KNOW a test is not necessary but are covering their arses because of the possibility of a future lawsuit if the test is NOT DONE (and this happens all the time, just ASK YOUR OWN DOCTOR), COST GO SKYROCKETING.
Lawyers are LIVING off the backs of doctors....you only have to turn on your TV set to see that.
Well, now ... that would be an impressive argument had not the tort reforms she cites been enacted because of her. But that's not true. Tort Reform was one of GWB's campaign issues in 2000 and 2004, and Congress actually passed some legislation on it in 2005.
The Texas tort reform legislation dates from 2003 (but it was a hot issue in the 80s and 90s, when I was living there).
She can't even take credit for the Alaska tort reform legislation: the Alaska Tort Reform Act was enacted in 1997, apparently with roots leading back to at least 1986. (fwiw, I provided the linked article only for the dates; I don't subscribe to its conclusions.)
It's pretty bold to say that people are "listening to Palin" when in fact she's only jumped onto a train that's been running for the past couple of decades.
No weaseling here. I was directing my remark at OldDeckHand. You are a bot.
Either a Romney-bot or and Anti-Palin-bot, but a bot nonetheless. I hope to break you of the vicious bot cycle and open your mind to accept that simplicity and principled governance can save America. To many conservatives want an Obama type BS artist who just sounds good and has eight degrees from Harvard. We just need someone who will read the law, follow the good ones, change or eliminate the bad ones, manage the taxpayer dollar the way a family manages theirs, and stop the slaughter of america’s future thru abortion. Sarah stands for those simple points of view.
We don’t need an obfuscater like the rest of these so-called contenders.
Your “stories” aren’t borne out by the evidence. You’ve bought the lie.
RIGHT ON, SARAH!
TORT REFORM
TORT REFORM NOW
TORT REFORM FIRST !!!!
Heck, you might even recall that it was a very prominent plank in GWB's campaign platform in '00 and '04, and he actually got Congressional legislation out of it in 2005 (albeit watered-down, but an accomplishment just the same, given the nature of the issue).
So just stop pretending this is some new thing that only Sarah Palin could have brought up.... it's not.
Not true. For example, Jim DeMint, Mitt Romney, and Bob Corker, for three, have continually pressed on the topic.
You may or may not agree with one or all of them, but to say they have "let it drop" is false.
Something like this...
I agree that there needs to be tort reform. However the fundamental problem is that insurance is picked by the employer and not the individual. The individual should be responsible for his decisions, not a corporation and certainly not the federal govt.
Who would have guessed Sarah Palin would be playing a big role in public policy via ... posting on Facebook? Talk about thinking outside the box. It’s great.
You betcha'
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