Republicans seek lifetime cap of 250,000 in case of medical malpractice - and you know that’s not going to get you far these days.
Without any public hearings (to assure that the press doesn’t show up), Chairman Goodlatte is pushing place hurdles in front of citizens who want to go after wrongdoers and deter future injuries and harms.
The bill proposes a cap of $250,000 for a lifetime of pain and suffering compensation in medical malpractice cases. This ties the hands of judges and juries from adequately awarding victims—especially children, homemakers and the elderly who have no wage losses to claim, and who often have the most serious disabling injuries.
In case you missed the peer-reviewed Johns Hopkins University Medical School study from last May, the physician-authors gave a conservative estimate that an average of 5,000 people a week die in the U.S. in hospitals due to preventable mishaps such as malpractice, medical errors, hospital-induced infections and bad drug prescriptions.
Imagine how many more patients are sickened or injured from these and other preventable acts.
Goodlatte and his henchmen are also pressing a bill to weaken the ability of consumers, investors and workers to band together in class actions when they are not able to afford hiring a lawyer to represent them for their individual harm. Since companies like Wells Fargo, drug and medical device companies, polluters and insurance giants are among wrongdoers, it is no wonder that their lobbyists want more immunity from the rule of law for corporate violations and damage to innocent people.
Another bill would harm asbestos victims who are waiting for their compensation before they die, forcing them to wait longer for compensation and leave their online and personal privacy vulnerable to violations and identity theft.
“More. We want more,” bellow the large corporate lobbyists on Capitol Hill.
For your interest and use, here is a list of Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee who turned their back on the American people:
Chairman Bob Goodlatte (VA-06)
Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, Jr. (WI-05)
Rep. Steve Chabot (OH-01)
Rep. Darrell Issa (CA-49)
Rep. Trent Franks (AZ-08)
Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01)
Rep. Ted Poe (TX-02) [voted NO on the medical malpractice bill]
Rep. Jason Chaffetz (UT-03)
Rep. Raúl Labrador (ID-01)
Rep. Blake Farenthold (TX-27)
Rep. Doug Collins (GA-09)
Rep. Ron DeSantis (FL-06)
Rep. John Ratcliffe (TX-04)
Rep. Mike Johnson (LA-04)
- Ralph Nader In The Public Interest
