Vested Interest - News and Notes - June 2007 Issue

June 2007 Issue > News

Longtime Ally Turns on Insurers

Mississippi U.S. Senator Trent Lott, the Senate’s No.2 Republican and longtime defender of insurers, has turned critic since he lost his home to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. While Lott recently settled with his insurer, State Farm, after a yearlong court battle, he is continuing the fight in the Senate. His experience, the senator said, has convinced him that an industry he defended his entire career is in need of reform. “I’m like a woman scorned,” Lott said. “I’m prepared to continue to kick their fanny until the last day I’m alive on this Earth because they have mistreated too many people.” Hurricane Katrina left nothing of his home. Lott became one of tens of thousands of Gulf Coast homeowners whose claims were rejected when State Farm decided the damage to his house was caused by flooding. (Bloomberg News – May 29, 2007)

Researchers Uncover Rare Harmful Effects from Drugs

Northwestern University researchers are uncovering rare and horrible side effects from blockbuster drugs. The blood thinner Plavix can trigger multi-organ failure that’s 90 percent fatal without emergency treatment. Crocrit, used to treat anemia in cancer patients, can cause life-threatening, bone-marrow failure. Zometa, Fosamaz and other bone-protection drugs used for cancer and osteoporosis can, paradoxically, cause deterioration of the jawbone that fosters infection and delays healing when teeth are pulled. Adverse drug reactions are among the 10 leading causes of deaths, killing as many as 100,000 patients a year in U.S. hospitals. Often rare, serious side effects do not show up until after a drug is approved by the FDA. Northwestern’s sleuthing program, called Research on Adverse Drug events, is funded by $12 million in federal grants. (Chicago Sun-Times – May 30, 2007)

The Best- and Worst-Paying Jobs in America

The medical profession continues to dominate the top end of Forbes 25 best- and worst-paying jobs in America. Anesthesiologists have flipped places with surgeons to take the top spot, but the next eight places are firmly in the healing hands of various sorts of specialist practitioners. Chief executives, at No. 10, and airline pilots, at No. 14, are the only two non-medical occupations in the top 15. Lawyers make the list at No. 16. The lowest paid of all include people who cook, prepare and serve in fast-food joints, followed by dishwashers, busboys and the folk who show you to your seat in coffee-shops and the like. According to government data, the mean annual salary for America’s 29,890 anesthesiologists is $184,340; for its 2.5 million fast-food preparers and servers, $15,230. The mean annual pay for all jobs is $39,190. The lowest-paying 25 occupations employ 15.6 million people in America; the best-paying jobs employ 3 million. The survey covers full- and part-time workers who are paid a wage or salary. It does not include the self-employed, owners and partners in unincorporated firms, household workers and unpaid family workers.(www.forbes.com) - June 12, 2007)

Lilly Settles Hundreds of Zyprexa Lawsuits

Eli Lilly and Co. has settled an additional 900 product liability lawsuits involving its top-selling drug, the anti-psychotic Zyprexa. The company declined to release the settlement amount. Lilly has settled roughly 28,500 product liability claims involving Zyprexa over the past two years. In June 2005, the company settled 8,000 claims for $690 million. This past January, it settled more than 18,000 for roughly $500 million. Most of the claims center on allegations that Zyprexa causes diabetes or high blood sugar and that labels on the drug failed to adequately warn users of the risks. Zyprexa generated $4.4 billion in sales last year and $1.1 billion during the first quarter of 2007. (www.nwi.com) - June 18, 2007)

Missouri SC Rules for Paint Companies in St. Louis’ Lead-Paint Case

The Missouri Supreme Court has narrowly rejected an appeal from the city of St. Louis over its public nuisance suit against former manufacturers of lead based paint. St. Louis hoped to recoup unstated costs of removing noxious lead paint from some city housing. Because the city couldn’t identify which company made which lead paint, it wanted to sue all six market participants. The paint companies prevailed at trial because of insufficient evidence presented by the city and an appellate court upheld the lower court ruling last fall. In a 4-3 ruling, the Supreme Court opinion agreed “The trial court did not err in entering summary judgment against the city based on its inability to provide any product identification evidence.” Similar suits have been filed in other states.(www.legalnewsline.com) - June 18, 2007)

Leading Conservative Activist Seeks Punitive Damages

Judge Robert Bork, one of the fathers of the modern judicial conservative movement whose nomination to the Supreme Court was rejected by the Senate, is seeking $1,000,000 in compensatory damages, plus punitive damages, after he slipped and fell at the Yale Club of New York City. Judge Bork was scheduled to give a speech at the club, but he fell when mounting the dais and injured his head and left leg. He alleges that the Yale Club is liable for the $1million plus punitive damages because they “wantonly, willfully, and recklessly” failed to provide staging which he could climb safely. Judge Bork has been a leading advocate of restricting plaintiffs’ ability to recover through tort law.(www.acsblog.org) – June 8, 2007)

Staph Superbug Infests Hospitals

A dangerous, drug-resistant staph germ may be infecting as many as 5 percent of hospital and nursing home patients. At least 300,000 U.S. hospital patients may have the superbug at any given time, according to a survey released by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology. The estimate is about 10 times the rate that some health officials previously had estimated. At issue is a superbug known as Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which cannot be tamed by certain common antibiotics. It is associated with sometimes horrific skin infections, but it also causes blood infections, pneumonia and other illnesses. The potentially fatal germ, which is spread by touch, typically thrives in health-care settings where people have open wounds. But in recent years, “community-associated” outbreaks have occurred among prisoners, children and athletes, with the germ spreading through skin contact or shared items. (AP – June 25, 2007)

Payments to Stop

Medicare has issued a proposal that will stop paying for avoidable hospital associated complications, and with it, major private insurance companies are expected to follow the lead and cut out payments for these common and expensive complications. The denial process will alert patients to the fact that their condition resulted from hospital error, and can be expected to increase malpractice claims for such complications and create a legal argument that these issues are automatically malpractice.

The issues targeted by the plan include:

1. Catheter-associated urinary tract infections.
2. Bed sores.
3. Objects left in after surgery.
4. Air embolism, or bubbles, in bloodstream from injection.
5. Patients given incompatible blood type.
6. Bloodstream staph infection.
7. Ventilator-associated pneumonia.
8. Vascular-catheter-associated infection.
9. Clostridium difficile-associated disease (gastrointestinal infections).
10. Drug-resistant staph infection.
11. Surgical site infections.
12. Wrong surgery.
13. Falls

Public Act 89-658 Held Unconstitutional

Illinois First Judicial Circuit Judge Phillip G. Palmer, in Williamson County, held unconstitutional Public Act 89-658, dealing with Underinsured Motor Vehicle Coverage. In a ruling on June 29, Judge Palmer ruled that Public Act 89-658 violates the Illinois Constitution of 1970, Article IV, Section 8(d) because it violates the single subject rule, which necessarily includes the amendments to 215 ILCS 5/143a-2(4). PA 89-658 mandated a comparison of the tortfeesor’s limits of liability with the underinsured motorists limits of liability. Judge Palmer’s ruling reinstate Cummins vs. Country Mutual Insurance Co. The case is Indiana Insurance Company vs. Mark Dunn and Tina Dunn.