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Medical Malpractice: Is it Time for Tort Reform in Maryland?

By Michael Krauss
Published on Wednesday, January 14, 2004
STUDIES

“A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” When the late Sen. Everett M. Dirksen from Illinois offered that famous quip about government spending 40 years ago, no one imagined that the same words might be used today to describe the American tort system. Yet last year a Florida jury conjured up punitive damages of $145 billion for a class of plaintiffs. The year before, a California jury recommended a $28 billion verdict for a single claimant. And in 1998, four major cigarette companies agreed to the mother of all awards: a quartertrillion- dollar settlement supposedly to reimburse states for the Medicaid costs of smoking-related illnesses.

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