Originally Posted by
Kasierith
That may not be their primary source of income.. but there is a connection. Every person needs health insurance, so the risk is significantly higher than other insurance sources. You have more instances where you're required to pay money back to your customers, and as a result you need to have more money coming in or you won't even be able to come even. Surgeries and medications are extremely expensive in the US, last I saw, and the increasing number of pharmaceutical medications used means that what an insurance company pays out is higher. The high prices are a stabilizing factor more than profit base. I personally look at most of the blame being on the pharmaceutical manufacturers, who have the absolute highest profit growth in the health care system.
Then perhaps my information is outdated.. coming from an outside source, there is a good chance that my knowledge no longer applies. But I am confused about what you're referring to... are you referring to comparing number of medical malpractice lawsuits over time to price of malpractice coverage over time? Please forgive me if I'm interpreting your statement wrong, I do sometimes get confused with English.. but wouldn't it make sense that there would be a correlation where the higher insurance is, the lower the incidence of being sued is? The insurance is meant to protect the doctors, after all.. so more money taken means more money used to protect doctors.
The entire purpose of an insurance company is to spread risk... if Paul was healthy 5 months later but Peter had a prescription to be filled Paul would be one of those helping to pay for it. As for the verdict, the lower the court the verdict is in, the more subject it is to personal bias. The arbitrary decision where they decided the doctor had 60% of the blame for his death seems a little off in and of itself.