Lobby Day for Doctors Won't Resolve Insurance 'Crisis'
Post-Standard (Syracuse, NY)
May 5, 2003

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To further expose the lawsuit-crisis myth, a report issued by Americans for Insurance Reform shows that insurance rates for physicians skyrocketed twice before: in the mid-1970s and again in the mid-1980s. Each "crisis" occurred during years of a weakened economy and plummeting interest rates. Sound familiar?

A study issued by a consortium of consumer organizations, including the New York Public Interest Research Group and the Center for Medical Consumers, concludes that insurance carriers have created a crisis where none exists. The study also found, after examining federal and state records, no evidence of a dramatic change in the trend of litigation against New York physicians. Consequently, last year the state Insurance Department turned down a rate-hike request from the state's leading malpractice insurance carrier. The state's No. 2 carrier did not even ask for an increase.

So why all the furor about New York's "deteriorating malpractice insurance climate?" Insurance is a cyclical industry. Rates rise when investment income is lowest, and fall when carriers are flush with money. Economics dictates rate increases, not jury awards. The cost of medical errors, however, is both real and considerable.

National statistical data from the federally funded Institute of Medicine estimates 44,000 people nationwide die every year from medical mistakes. In New York, as many as 6,000 people die annually in hospitals alone, due to preventable medical errors.

For a copy of the complete article, contact AIR.