August 23, 2007

Plaintiff's lawyers are hoping the much-publicized Mattel toy recall and related scandals arising from lead-tainted Chinese toys will boost their campaign to get courts to accept the idea of "medical monitoring" suits under which consumers with no signs of injury sue for the cost of periodic checkups to reassure themselves that they are still not ill. About 15 states, including California and Illinois, have shown favor toward such suits, according to experts cited in the WSJ law blog. Philadelphia's Legal Intelligencer and the ABA Journal have more. We've had considerable coverage of the medical monitoring issue, most recently by Deborah La Fetra last week.