CONGRESS TO MULL MEDICAL LIABILITY REFORMS
Republican lawmakers are on the verge of renewing their push for medical liability legislation, which will likely contain a provision that critics contend would bar punitive damages against drugmakers that market dangerous products.
President Bush recently pushed his plan for medical malpractice reform before a group of Illinois physicians, arguing that "junk lawsuits" against doctors and hospitals are driving up costs and damaging healthcare services.
Although Bush didn't directly mention the liability issues facing the pharmaceutical industry in the speech, he expressed his support for a reform bill that passed the House last session, but languished in the Senate. Bush vowed to work with House leadership to get a new bill moving in this Congress.
The bill that passed the House -- the Help Efficient, Accessible, Low-Cost, Timely Healthcare Act of 2003, H.R. 5 -- contained a provision that would prevent consumers from suing a drug firm for punitive damages if the firm complied with necessary FDA standards to win approval of the product. Such a law would have shielded Merck, which is facing billions of dollars in lawsuits after it abruptly pulled its arthritis drug Vioxx (rofecoxib) last fall for safety reasons.
But critics contend Bush's liability reform plan would unfairly protect drugmakers. Democratic senators have vowed to block any reform bill that would shield drug companies. "Congress should not be giving a free pass to big drug companies at a time when millions of Americans may have had their health put at risk by pharmaceutical giants," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).