Dick Durbin: “In fact, we had a limited hearing last February on the issue but not on this bill. Senator Coleman of Minnesota had a…”

“In fact, we had a limited hearing last February on the issue but not on this bill. Senator Coleman of Minnesota had a hearing in the Governmental Affairs Committee to talk about the general issue of medical malpractice, where the administration testified we are facing an epidemic of medical malpractice in America. But no one has sat down to measure whether this bill will actually reduce malpractice premiums. The only studies that have been done by the General Accounting Office, as well as by a group known as the Weiss Institute, have come to the conclusion that limiting the recovery of victims in medical malpractice lawsuits is no guarantee of malpractice premiums coming down. In fact, in many cases of States with caps on the recovery, limitations on recovery for malpractice victims, the malpractice premiums for doctors have gone up. There is no linear connection or guarantee that limiting the recovery for victims is going to help the doctors, yet that is the only solution that is before us on the floor today.”