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More Doctors Join Insurance Protest

By Lindsay F. Wiley [Bio]

February 15, 2003 - Doctors in New York and Connecticut are planning to join doctors in a growing list of other states in protesting rising malpractice insurance costs that they say are crippling their practices. Earlier this month, New Jersey doctors held limited walkouts. New York and Connecticut doctors are not planning walkouts but plan to use lobbying efforts to urge their state legislatures to institute tort reforms, including caps on the pain and suffering damages that they say are behind the recent rise in insurance rates.

These protests come soon after President Bush's announcement in the State of the Union address that he would like to cap non-economic damages for medical malpractice at $250,000. Last week, congressmen reintroduced a bill in the House aimed at limiting pain and suffering damages for medical malpractice suits.

Christopher D. Bernard, president of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association, argues that insurance companies, not malpractice plaintiffs, are to blame for rising premiums. He explained that premiums were artificially low while insurance companies reaped large profits from stock investments. In the current economy, he said, companies are trying to make up losses by increasing premiums.