While folks on one end of the Rayburn House Office building yesterday were finalizing plans for next year's defense budget, members of the House Judiciary Committee quietly forwarded Rep. Maurice Hinchey's bill which would permit servicemembers to sue the military in certain cases of medical malpractice.
It's a first big step forward for Hinchey's proposal, although it's still a long shot to pass both the full House and Senate (a companion bill, sponsored by Sen. Charles Schumer, is working through the Senate). The bill would allow civil lawsuits against military doctors in cases of clear medical negligence, something that's currently prohibited under federal law.
That's because of the Feres Doctrine, a legal precedent from the 1947 death of active-duty soldier Lt. Rudolph Feres who was killed in a barracks fire. His widow sued the Army for negligence, claiming the facility had a defective heating plant and substandard fire safety controls, but the Supreme Court ruled that servicemembers performing military duties do not fall under federal rules allowing lawsuits against the government.
Hinchey's bill is named for Carmelo Rodriguez, a Marine Corps sergeant who died in January 2007 after a lenghty battle with skin cancer. Military doctors first diagnosed the cancer 10 years earlier, but a series of military doctors failed to warn him of the life-threating illness for nearly eight years. When his family tried to sue the Corps to force changes in medical notifications, the courts turned them away.
Critics of Hinchey's bill say the measure opens the door for time-consuming, frivolous lawsuits and will discourage potential recruits from joining the military.
But in a statement yesterday, the American Association for Justice called the proposal a basic issue of fairness.
“Currently, the law unfairly treats our brave servicemen and women as second-class citizens,” said Anthony Tarricone, president of the association. “But this legislation would restore their basic legal rights and protect them from injuries they receive as a result of preventable medical errors.”
[PHOTO: Supreme Court]
Malpracting and Sueing Military Drs
Personally, I think this is a good thing. Too often we in the military are "ginea pigs". A few years ago there was a scandal at Bethesda Naval Medical Center about a doctor who was still operating even though he was legally blind. No one wanted to stand up to him and tell him not to do this. Finally, after a lot of surgeries went wrong and the military spouses sued - that is when the situation was corrected. That situation never should have been allowed to happen in the first place.