Causation

  • Read more: More on the ECJ Vaccine Liability Decision
    Article

    More on the ECJ Vaccine Liability Decision

    By Alex Stein My friend and mentor, the former Israeli Chief Justice Aharon Barak, used to say that when neither side likes the court’s decision, chances are that the court was right. This is likely to be the case with the European Court of Justice (ECJ) decision on vaccine manufacturers’ liability, N.W. et al. v. Sanofi…

  • Read more: Vaccine Liability in Europe: A New Development
    Article

    Vaccine Liability in Europe: A New Development

    By Alex Stein Yesterday, the European Court of Justice has issued an important ruling on vaccine manufacturers liability. N.W. et al. v. Sanofi Pasteur MSD, C‑621/15. This ruling triggered a hailstorm of criticism from different media outlets, including CNN. These outlets, however, have largely misreported the ruling and its underlying reasons, partly because of this misleading…

  • Read more: Reforming the approach to clinical negligence in the National Health Service (NHS)
    Article

    Reforming the approach to clinical negligence in the National Health Service (NHS)

    By John Tingle The Department of Health in England  have just published a consultation paper on the Governments proposal to introduce a Rapid Resolution and Redress Scheme (RRR) – a voluntary administrative compensation scheme for families affected by severe avoidable birth injury. Action against Medical Accidents (AvMA) the UK charity for patient safety and justice…

  • Read more: Tort Law: Public and Private
    Article

    Tort Law: Public and Private

    By Alex Stein Readers interested in medical malpractice might be interested in seeing—and commenting on—my new article, The Domain of Torts, forthcoming in 117 Colum. L. Rev. (2017). This Article advances a novel positive theory of the law of torts that grows out of a careful and extensive reading of the case law. The Article’s core…

  • Read more: Malpractice, Terminal Patients, and Cause in Fact
    Article

    Malpractice, Terminal Patients, and Cause in Fact

    By Alex Stein Any person interested in medical malpractice or torts in general must read the Missouri Supreme Court’s recent decision, Mickels v. Danrad, 486 S.W.3d 327 (Mo. 2016). This decision involved a physician who negligently failed to diagnose the presence of a malignant brain tumor, from which the patient was doomed to die. The patient first saw the physician when…

  • Read more: Understanding “Lost Chances to Recover” (and Looney v. Moore)
    Article

    Understanding “Lost Chances to Recover” (and Looney v. Moore)

    By Alex Stein My colleague, Professor Tony Sebok, drew my attention to an important recent decision, Looney v. Moore, 2015 WL 4773747 (N.Dist.Ala. 2015, by Chief United States District Judge Karon O. Bowdre). This decision adjudicated a textbook lost-chance case that involved the effects of oxygen saturation levels (SpO2) in premature infants with extremely low birth…

  • Read more: Proving Decision-Causation
    Article

    Proving Decision-Causation

    By Alex Stein Proving decision-causation in a suit for informed-consent violation is never easy. Things get even worse when a trial judge misinterprets the criteria for determining – counterfactually – whether the patient would have agreed to the chosen treatment if she were to receive full information about its benefits, risks, and alternatives. The recent Tennessee…