Corp Reform - Not Tort Reform

A Useful Blog About The Drug Industry

I came across an informative blog, drugindustry.co.uk, that commented on Bill Frist's "solution" to the avian flu crisis: Immunize vaccine manufacturers from suit. 

"The premise behind the liability shield is familiar, even plausible: American drugmakers have been pulling out of the vaccine business for the last 20 years, and fear of lawsuits must be one reason. But that argument falls apart on close examination. A recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found only 10 lawsuits in the last 20 years over flu vaccines; the authors have concluded that drug companies withdrew from the vaccine business mainly because of low-profit margins and unpredictable demand."

Good to know Dr. Frist, as always, puts profits before patients.  (Do you have any idea how happy I'll be if that Hippocratic hypocrite is indicted by the SEC?)

"Buying The Tort"

I'm not sure he uses the best example, but KipEsquire used a great phrase - "Buying The Tort" - to describe a situation when an individual or company commits a tort because it's profitable.  He, like me, argues that in many cases, punitive damages are the only way to deter tortfeasors and would-be tortfeasors:

"Now imagine if there were no such thing as punitive damages. People like these jackasses could go around in their balaclavas scaring the bejeesus out of people in order to make a buck (or, perhaps worse, just for the heck of it) as often as they liked. The threat of a lawsuit, based just on compensatory damages, would be no threat at all. This is what is known as "buying the tort" — tortfeasors knowingly committing torts knowing that even if they get sued, it's "worth it." (In negligence, by contrast, the defendant isn't knowingly doing anything wrong -- that's the very definition of negligence.)"

Buying the tort.  I'm surprised I've never heard that phrase before...