The Manhattan Institute's Trial Lawyers Inc. series today published its latest update on the workings of the litigation industry, "Health Hazard: Litigation Increases Medical Costs, but Lawyers Block Reform". Excerpt:

Notwithstanding the president's remarks and popular opinion, Congress has been laboring to expand medical liability against nursing homes, medical-device makers, and military doctors--changes that would be expected to drive up, not down, health-care costs.

The paper also explains the "denominator game" often played by Litigation Lobby advocates to minimize the apparent percentage impact of medical liability -- for example, they will pack into the denominator of the fraction as many health-related services as they can come up with (pharmaceuticals, nursing homes, wheelchair manufacture, physical rehab therapy) while then limiting the numerator in unrealistically narrow ways (i.e., payouts in lawsuits against medical doctors only, not providers of health care more broadly defined)

An audio podcast in which MI health policy director Paul Howard interviews James Copland is here. Coverage: Freddoso/Examiner, Wood/ShopFloor, Rizo/SE Texas Record, Paul Howard/NRO "Critical Condition", Corrinne Hess/Milwaukee Business Journal, Waterbury Republican-American; related Jim Copland Examiner op-ed.