Insurers, doctors set up straw man

To the editor:

Finally, someone has looked beyond the rhetoric of tort reformers and addressed the basic problem, which is insurance companies. State Sen. Joan Bray, D-St. Louis, said, "The heart of this issue is really the soaring cost of medical malpractice insurance premiums. But with the volume turned up on all these arguments, the insurance industry escapes unnoticed." All those doctors dressed in white coats have turned the volume up.

At first, I thought that doctors were acting in good faith, that they believed tort reform would assure that their medical malpractice insurance rates would decrease. After it became public knowledge that is not the case, I could only assume they have a subtext.

Surely they are continuing to cry wolf regarding what prompts high insurance rates because they want to keep the cost of medical malpractice at a minimum. It is one thing for doctors to say they can't afford their high insurance premiums. It is quite another for them to let it be known what a low monetary value they place on the lives of their victims.

Fortunately, Bray, supported by Senate Minority Leader Maida Coleman, D-St. Louis, saw through this ruse and introduced an insurance bill, Senate Bill 83.

Once again, tort reform has reared its ugly head in Tennessee. I hope that Tennessee legislators will follow Bray's lead and not be fooled by the straw man that insurance companies and doctors have set up to protect their interests.

JANE MARSHALL, Clarksville, Tenn.