Beltway Democrats are rightly concerned about the rising cost of health care in the United States. But they sure have a funny way of showing it.
On Thursday, Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., introduced a bill that would establish nationwide caps in medical malpractice judgments. For tens of thousands of physicians in high-risk specialties, increases in their malpractice insurance premiums have outpaced the growth of medical expenses overall. Those increased costs have forced many doctors to refuse new patients and practice costly "defensive medicine" by ordering a battery of unnecessary, expensive diagnostics to limit liability. Other physicians have simply retired from medicine.
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Caps on malpractice judgments, which offer insurance companies protection against preposterously large judgments, can at least slow those premium increases. Several states, including Nevada, have enacted their own caps on damages awarded for a patient's pain and suffering.
But a federal standard would supply immediate relief everywhere. Considering the federal government is the country's largest health care consumer, paying about 60 percent of the nation's medical bills through Medicare, Medicaid and other programs, you'd think every member of Congress would support it.
But you'd be forgetting that Democrats are beholden to the trial lawyers who make a handsome living suing doctors. And Sen. Ensign's bill, in addition to limiting malpractice plaintiffs to $750,000 in noneconomic damages, also places limits on the fees collected by personal injury attorneys.
Senate Democrats, most of them lawyers themselves, say they're opposed to the legislation because it could shortchange injured patients to the benefit of greedy doctors, insurance companies and health care corporations. In reality, they oppose it because it could deprive lawyers of payouts that cover their coastal villas and country club initiation fees. Minority Democrats are planning to shelve Sen. Ensign's proposal through a procedural vote.
How can Democrats condemn the ability of health care providers and insurance companies to profit from their services while sheltering the ability of lawyers to make vast, undeserved fortunes at the expense of a few unfortunate patients? They can't have it both ways.
Here's hoping Sen. Ensign gets his bill through for an up-or-down floor vote.
