You Don’t Say?

From the Department of the Bleeding Obvious, the Houston Chronicle tells us:

An influx of doctors lured to Texas by new limits on malpractice lawsuits has overwhelmed the state board that screens candidates for medical licenses, creating a backlog that forces many applicants to wait months before they can start seeing patients.

Officials said many of the relocating physicians are filling shortages in areas such as Beaumont, where trauma patients previously had to be flown other cities because there weren’t enough surgeons to treat them.

I wonder if SiCKO! or its supporters have any clue that the typical physician is paying tens of thousands for insurance to defend himself from the lawyer lottery malpractice suits that deluge our courts. It’s not unusual for an OB/GYN to pay six figues.  I wonder if they know that the price of drugs includes lawsuits like the Leonel Garza one.

An abundance of physicians will mean a drop in price for patients, even it means less money for trial lawyers. It will mean more options for even the poorest Texans. And the modest limits on punitive damages may result in less defensive medicine and unnecessary ass-covering tests.  Everyone wins . . . except the lawyers.

“But Mike!” you say in your best John Edwards voice, “Won’t this mean more bad doctors coming to Texas?” I’ll let Overlawyered respond for me:

God forbid anyone reading this or their loved one should be in a position to be seeking damages, economic or otherwise, for medical malpractice. But short of the argument that, well, higher non-economic damages should be available just because they should—or proof, in ten years, that there’s more malpractice in Texas than there was before because of the influx of quack doctors attracted to the free bread crumbs of “easy” med-mal limits—this quacks like a policy that works.

The legal system is most definitely not a free market.  We have laws written by lawyers, cases presided over by lawyers where lawyers make most of the money, including lawyer-wannabees who are glorified by Hollywood.  And our Moore-supported consumer advocates resort to lies (scroll down to Nader; the 2003 links are dead) to support ATLA.  It’s a rigged system.  So will Michael Moore’s next movie be SuED! and documents the horrific cost of our civil legal system?

Don’t hold your breath.