Lawsuits That Make Care Costly

Columnist Steven Pearlstein was correct in noting that various factors have contributed to rising health-care costs ["Self-Help for the Health-Care System," Business, June 17]. But, like many analysts, he understated the impact of medical liability litigation.

A 2006 Harvard School of Public Health study found that four out of every 10 medical malpractice lawsuits filed each year are "without merit."

Serving primarily to enrich the personal-injury lawyers who drive them, these lawsuits add significantly to overall health-care costs.

How much? In a Massachusetts Medical Society survey published last November, 83 percent of Bay State physicians cited the fear of being sued in their decisions to practice "defensive medicine," a phenomenon that adds at least $1.4 billion to annual health-care costs in that state alone.

According to the 900 doctors surveyed, on average, 18 to 28 percent of tests, procedures, referrals, and consultations and 13 percent of hospitalizations were ordered to avoid lawsuits.

Such findings make it clear: If any health-care reforms are to succeed, they must be buttressed by liability reform. Certainly real victims of negligence must be fairly compensated, but public policy must discourage litigation that abuses our civil justice system and makes health care less accessible and more expensive.

DARREN McKINNEY

Director of Communications

American Tort Reform Association

Washington