Bush Addresses Malpractice Insurance Concerns
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Well, as we said, there is a lot going on today, a lot of live events. While we were listening into the one live event, President Bush was speaking at the AMA, the American Medical Association convention. I want to bring in John King -- and we are going to get to the medical aspects in just a moment but John, he -- the president used that opportunity to talk about some other things happening in the world as well. The possibility of war with Iraq, and also the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.</s>JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Daryn. That arrest made Saturday in Pakistan. Today is first time President Bush has discussed it publicly as we've been showing in our live coverage. His Homeland Security team, if you will, the attorney general, the FBI director, and the Homeland secretary, Tom Ridge, all on Capitol Hill. The president, though, at the top of a speech on health care reform to the American Medical Association offered his first thoughts on that big arrest.</s>GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: American and Pakistani authorities struck a serious blow to al Qaeda by arresting Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the top operational planner, the top killer of the al Qaeda network. The man who mastermind the September the 11th attacks is no longer a problem to the United States of America.</s>KING: So the president celebrating there what the administration believes is a critical victory in the broader war on terrorism. As the president was speaking, up in New York, Kofi Annan, the U.N. secretary-general, said he believed it was a positive development that Iraq was now destroying its Al Samoud 2 missiles. President Bush striking a very different tone in that speech earlier today. He said that, in his view, the Iraqi leader has shown no commitment at all to disarm. President Bush, who faces some fateful decisions over the next week or two about whether to go to war, said in that speech, make no mistake about it, Saddam Hussein will be disarmed one way or another -- Daryn.</s>KAGAN: And John, as I mentioned off the top, the speech in front of the AMA -- or to the AMA, a big issue on Medicare and prescription drug benefits. Some ideas out there about how to solve some big problems, but Republicans having some different versions than the Democrats.</s>KING: Well, these issues -- these domestic issues not getting as much attention because of the focus on possible war in Iraq, and the war on terrorism. The president offering a framework today for Medicare reform that includes a prescription drug benefit. It is quite controversial. The president wants to encourage elderly Americans -- 40 million Americans get their health care from Medicare. The president wants to encourage them to move from traditional Medicare to preferred provider networks, or managed care systems. And so the president says anyone on Medicare should get a prescription drug benefit, but the president says that benefit would be much more generous, in his view, if you move to one of those managed care systems. Democrats are critical of this. The president had planned to send up very detailed legislation. Congressional Republicans complained that that could be political suicide for them because of the power of this issue in politics, so the president offering his framework today on Medicare, also reiterating his ideas for medical malpractice reform. That will be one of the most contentious policy and political debates in the coming months in Congress, with or without a war in Iraq, it just doesn't get as much attention, but it is critical, not only to domestic policy, but to the political futures of both parties and this president -- Daryn.</s>KAGAN: John King at the White House. John, thank you so much. Want to bring in our medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen to talk a little bit more about this malpractice issue. This has been getting a lot of attention in the media, hearing of surgeons who decided not to continue practicing, and other specialties because their malpractice insurance just too high, they claim, in order to make it worth their while to stay in business.</s>ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, and that's what the president talked to the doctors at the AMA about. He gave several examples of where doctors have had to stop practicing, or have had to move away to another area, the president says, because of these insurance premiums that have gone sky high. Here is one of the examples that the president mentioned.</s>BUSH: There is a story about the lady -- and this happens all the time in Nevada -- named Ruth Valentine (ph). She's pregnant. She called more than 50 local doctors and she couldn't find anybody in Nevada to serve her. So she went to Utah, where she is staying with friends until he has her baby.</s>COHEN: Now, the president mentioned OB-GYNs in particular. Nationally, their premiums -- their insurance premiums went up 20 percent in just one year in 2002. In South Florida, where the rates are particularly high, some OB- GYNs pay up to $210,000 a year in insurance. Let's take a look at these jury awards that the president was talking about. Jury awards can get very high in medical malpractice cases. In 1994, the average ward was $362,500 -- or the median award, rather. In 2000, that number went up to $1 million. So what the president has proposed is a $250,000 cap on pain and suffering. You wouldn't be able to get any more than that if a doctor makes a mistake, and a $250,000 cap on punitive damages. Now, just this morning, a woman who says that she was a victim of medical error, she said that she opposes those bans. This woman says she went in for a hysterectomy. She ended up paralyzed from the shoulders down, and she said, why should there be any kind of a cap when a doctor has made such a terrible error?</s>KAGAN: And as you and I were having a chance to discuss before, these two sides are so far apart, they can't even agree on what the problem is, let alone what the possible solutions are to these huge problems.</s>COHEN: Absolutely. They can't even agree on the statistics. You ask each side, What was the average size jury award in 2002? And they completely disagree on it. They disagree what the problem is. For example, this woman who testified today who ended up in a wheelchair, someone like her would say, Well, why are you putting a cap on people who have suffered like me? Why don't you go after the insurance companies? Why don't you tell them to keep their premiums down? They are just out to make money. So people have lots of different solutions as to how to solve this problem.</s>KAGAN: Depending on where you are coming from.</s>COHEN: Exactly. Absolutely.</s>KAGAN: Elizabeth Cohen, thank you so much.</s>COHEN: OK. Thanks. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com