In case you doubted it: "...a search of federal civil litigation trends over the past five years reveals that the practice areas with the largest growth are products liability, securities, intellectual property, antitrust, and employment.

"Products liability cases have surged since 2001 to an anticipated 25,700 cases in 2004 and now make up nearly 10 percent of all federal civil filings. In particular, the estimated 24,100 cases dealing with personal injuries continue to grow and now account for 94 percent of all products liability cases." (Kevin Stehr (vice president for strategic market planning at LexisNexis), "Spot the Litigation Trends", Legal Times, Oct. 7).