- 5/29/2025
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) vetoes a "Free Kill" law relating to medical malpractice.
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NewsTranscript
00:00We are joined by a number of folks, many of whom you know.
00:05We're joined by our great Florida Surgeon General, Dr. Joseph Latipo.
00:11We also have the present CEO of Lee Health, Dr. Larry Antonucci.
00:15Dr. Nick Panetta is the chair of the Department of Plastic Surgery at USF Health
00:20and faculty at the Moffitt Cancer Center's Center for Women's Oncology.
00:24We have President of the Florida Justice Reform Institute, William Large.
00:30President and CEO of the Florida Hospital Association, Mary Mayhew.
00:33Where's Mary? I didn't see her.
00:35Okay, yes.
00:36And then Andy Bolin is a partner at Bolin Law Group.
00:39Before I get into some of that, I do want to point out that recently, I think it was two days ago,
00:45the HHS and CDC removed the COVID mRNA shot from the childhood immunization schedule.
00:54And I think that was the correct move.
00:56But I also think it's something that Joe Latipo had been talking about for a couple years,
01:01just based on the data that we had, based on what we knew about COVID, what we knew about the MNRA shots,
01:08and how that got added was not evidence-based.
01:12It was more just basically following whatever the narrative was at the time.
01:16So when he came out for that in Florida was there, oh, my gosh, the wailing and the carping and everything like that.
01:24But the reality was, you know, his job and our job is not to just follow the crowd or follow narratives,
01:32but to actually follow the evidence.
01:35And that's what Joe did.
01:36I think that's what they're doing now.
01:38And, I mean, I think a lot of parents got it because the uptake was incredibly low for this
01:43because they saw that there was not a proven benefit.
01:47They didn't even get into whatever, you know, negative effects would be.
01:50There wasn't a proven benefit.
01:52So I want to thank him for his leadership there,
01:55and I'm glad that now we're seeing that reflected in Washington, D.C.
01:59Now, we are here today to discuss one specific issue regarding medical practice and litigation.
02:10But before I do that, there's kind of a broader context that we're here.
02:14Since I've been governor, we have worked, when I became governor in 2019,
02:19Florida was considered what they termed a judicial hellhole.
02:25And part of that is because we had an activist judiciary,
02:30which really wreaked havoc in this state for many, many decades across a wide variety of issues.
02:37When I became governor, though, there is a seven-member court.
02:41It was a four-to-three split in the wrong direction.
02:44Three of the four, though, had mandatory retirement.
02:48So when I got sworn in, they had to leave the court.
02:50So I was able to make three appointments,
02:53and we really transformed the court from that activist bastion where good reforms would just be batted down,
03:02more on political grounds than anything,
03:04into one that's much more predictable in upholding the law.
03:08And that's not even true in a medical context.
03:11It's true in the business context.
03:13It's true in individual freedoms as well.
03:17So that really, the Supreme Court change, was absolutely huge.
03:21And, you know, there have been things that had been passed by voters in the past many decades
03:27that that court would nullify effectively.
03:31And then the legislature would do a lot of things, and they would nullify.
03:35So those days are over.
03:36And that effectively ended judicial activism in the state of Florida just my first month in office.
03:42But we also had the fact that Florida was a haven for frivolous litigation.
03:50And, you know, there are times when people's rights are at stake, people have been harmed,
03:55and they have every right to go into court and to seek compensation.
04:01But what happens is that when you have the floodgates open,
04:06there's an incentive for lawyers to bring cases knowing that if someone sues you,
04:13even if you are 100% in the right, just the cost of having to defend that can be very, very prohibitive.
04:23And so a lot of times if lawyers drive cases, it's cheaper for you to do a settlement,
04:30even if you did anything wrong, because taking it all the way to verdict,
04:34and if you win 100%, you had to pay all these fees for attorneys and for defense
04:40just to be able to effectively show that you weren't in the wrong at all.
04:45So that creates a lot of distortions in the economy, in medical practice.
04:50It imposes costs on our economy and our society.
04:55And certainly we've seen things like auto insurance rates and things of that nature driven in large part
05:03because Florida had been such a haven for so many litigation.
05:08And really earned that moniker as being a litigation nightmare.
05:14We have done a lot over the years to do really significant litigation reform.
05:19And that goes all the way back to 2019 when we curved the unchecked use of so-called assignment of benefits
05:26that allowed third-party contractors to sue insurers directly.
05:31That drove up costs and clogged the courts with really a flood of lawsuits.
05:36And you think about it, it's like you have a policy, you have a claim,
05:39and this becomes like a cottage industry to assign that benefit and this and that.
05:44And that clearly got out of hand.
05:45So the legislature was able to pass legislation I signed to curb that.
05:50We also continued to build off that in 2021 and 2022
05:55with reforms to how property insurance litigation has happened.
06:01And basically Florida was one of a few states that said if somebody sues and they win,
06:09then they get attorney's fees.
06:11But if they sue and they lose, the other side does not get attorney's fees.
06:16Well, that's a major incentive to bring litigation.
06:19And so that is not free.
06:22That imposed costs, as those costs are put through the system,
06:27that helps drive the price that people pay for normal products
06:31and the premiums that they pay for that.
06:34So that had been something that had been very difficult to do,
06:37and yet it's now been a little more than two years since those insurance reforms were done.
06:44And the results are S&P Global said in 24, the first full year that that was in effect,
06:52Florida had the lowest increase in property insurance in the entire country out of all 50.
06:57Who would have thought that?
06:59And the reason is just because you're removing this incentive to litigate
07:04even when there really shouldn't be litigation.
07:07It makes it less costly.
07:09That's why so many people are coming in to do business in Florida.
07:13You know, California, they're all leaving for insurance.
07:16Like the people that had the fires, they're leaving.
07:18Florida, we've had companies moving in since these reforms.
07:22Who would have thought that?
07:23This is a state that's the most complex insurance market for property in the country,
07:29maybe even in the world.
07:30We've had six major hurricanes in seven years.
07:34I know people in southwest Florida are very familiar with the last few years in particular.
07:39And yet, so far this year, you're basically seeing the rates be stable.
07:45You haven't seen them go up 30% like they were prior to these reforms.
07:51So that's something that's been meaningful.
07:54It has added stability.
07:55You have seen more people come into the market.
07:57There's just no question that that's the case.
08:00Then the following year, 2023, the legislature passed and I signed a broader tort reform and
08:08litigation reform, even outside the context of property insurance.
08:13And that, I think that's had people could tell you small businesses, it's had a, it's had a
08:17positive effect here, but on auto insurance rates.
08:21So, so far this year, the average auto insurance from the major companies is down four or five
08:27percent in Florida.
08:29It's up almost everywhere else.
08:31And auto insurance has been the number one inflationary item across the country over the
08:36last four years.
08:37And the only reason Florida saw a decrease, our drivers aren't getting any better.
08:41I can tell you that.
08:44It's a, it's a tough nut to crack, you know, it just is.
08:48But the reason why is because of the litigation reform.
08:51I mean, that, that's the reason why.
08:53And you talk to any company, why are they able to offer more affordable rates?
08:57Well, it's because we've removed the incentive to litigate first and ask questions later.
09:02And that has reduced costs throughout the system.
09:05So, so this has been a lot of heavy lifting.
09:08There have been people that have been involved in, in Florida government and in the political
09:12scene for like 25 years who've been trying to get legal reform to get us more in line with,
09:20uh, uh, with, with what works.
09:22And, you know, you can see some of these things in different parts of the country.
09:25Uh, Texas did litigation reform, uh, and, and, and they had positive results.
09:30Other states, honestly, even states like California have done some, uh, that, that you wouldn't think,
09:36but even, even they have done in certain areas.
09:39So, so that's, that's what you do now for whatever reason, even though all these Republicans
09:44in the legislature have voted for, for these reforms and they've been praised for the reforms,
09:50you had a movement in the house of representatives to undo the tort reforms that have been done
09:57and enacted in Florida.
09:59And that had shown to have produced stability in some of these really, really tricky markets.
10:04Uh, and, and it failed, um, and, in every instance, except, except one to even advance past
10:11the house, uh, the Florida Senate said they wouldn't consider it.
10:15Uh, I was not going to support, uh, what they were doing.
10:18Now, the one bill that they did was a bill to undo legal reform and tort reform, not anything
10:27that, that was done under my tenure though, something that had been done many decades ago
10:31in the early 1990s when Florida was facing a crisis in malpractice insurance premiums and lawsuits
10:40that were driving premiums high, uh, physicians were leaving the state, it really had a, a bad
10:46impact on access to care, so the Florida legislature overhauled how medical malpractice actions are
10:54done, uh, in these instances of, of, of, of the wrongful death.
10:58And what they did was they did something that, um, some states also do.
11:03I think it's a, it's a minority of states that have Florida right now.
11:07I think it may have been some more at the time, but what they basically said is, um, you
11:12know, medical negligence, obviously you have a right to go in, um, and get compensation.
11:18If something happens to you, of course, uh, you can do that.
11:21But they limited two instances to where you could sue for economic damages, but you couldn't
11:28sue for so-called non-economic damages.
11:31And those two classes were if you had an adult child age 25 or older who was not dependent
11:38on a parent with no surviving spouse.
11:41If you had an action that 25 or older independent, uh, child could sue and get economic damages,
11:50but they could not sue for so-called non-economic damages.
11:54And the same would apply if a parent was suing on behalf of a 25 or older, uh, minor child,
12:03or child, independent child with no surviving spouse or no heirs.
12:06You can sue for the economic damages, uh, but not.
12:09And the question is, well, why did they do that?
12:12And they did it because when you talk about economic damages, those are quantifiable.
12:16You can say you were harmed, here's, here's the damage, and you can recover.
12:21When you do non-economic, uh, it is basically what a jury wants to award.
12:27Now that's something that's very appealing if you're, uh, a plaintiff's attorney because
12:31if you can get a contingency fee out of a big award, you know, you can make millions and
12:36millions of dollars potentially on an individual case.
12:39So it was the legislature's view that limiting to economic damages would be a deterrent for
12:48cases being brought, um, you know, across kind of, uh, in, in large numbers, right?
12:54And so that had been the law in Florida for many decades.
12:58Uh, what the legislature did, uh, this time is, is they repealed that portion of the medical
13:05malpractice, uh, reform, and, you know, for me, I think that, uh, if you, you do, we,
13:13we have a right to expect, uh, that, that physicians are gonna meet appropriate standards.
13:18Uh, there's a lot that goes into it.
13:20I mean, the state of Florida provides a lot of support for training physicians and, and
13:24everything.
13:25And, and if somebody is careless, um, and certainly even worse, uh, there needs to be accountability.
13:31But I think the question is, is in a case like this, what's the best way to do that?
13:36Is it to open floodgates for non-economic damages, knowing you're gonna get a lot of lawsuits that
13:42are gonna be brought, um, against a lot of physicians who, who weren't necessarily negligent,
13:47right?
13:48Because, you know, when you're practicing medicine, you can do everything right and you may not
13:52get a good, you may not get a, a good outcome with the patient.
13:56There's not a warranty of cure.
13:57These are difficult things.
13:59Sometimes there's pluses and minuses for what a physician would do.
14:03Physician will consult the patient, tell them that here are the options, and sometimes a
14:07patient will, will opt for a course of treatment or, or a surgery, knowing that there's high
14:13odds that, that it may not be successful.
14:16And, and, and all these things are very sad, whether the physician was perfect or whether
14:20the physician was not.
14:21If somebody doesn't make it through that, um, you know, that is a tragedy in, in, in one
14:26form or another, and the loss for a, a family member, even, even in someone that's an adult
14:32and independent at that point, it, it is real.
14:34Um, and, and I think everybody appreciates that.
14:37I think the question though is, is what would this legislation do for costs of healthcare in
14:43Florida, access to care in Florida, and our ability to recruit and, and keep physicians?
14:49And I know you're going to hear from people today, uh, but it's, and it's their judgment.
14:54It's also my judgment that if this legislation would, would, would be enacted, it would lead
14:59to higher costs for Floridians.
15:01It would lead to less access to care for Floridians, uh, and it would make it harder for us to keep,
15:07uh, recruit and maintain physicians in the state of Florida.
15:11And we, I mean, we need more as it is now, uh, the state's not shrinking.
15:15It's growing population continues to age.
15:17You're going to need more and more there.
15:19So what could have been done that, that would have made this acceptable?
15:24Well, I think two things, you know, could be done.
15:27One is focus on holding the physician directly accountable, uh, with, with regulatory actions.
15:34See, you know, you do a malpractice, uh, suit.
15:37The physician doesn't pay it.
15:38It's the insurance company that pays it.
15:40So it's not a perfect or even a great deterrent for, uh, medical negligence.
15:46A third party is paying the costs.
15:48Uh, we have disciplinary procedures in place, but if there's ways to do that so that folks
15:54are held accountable, I'm all for that.
15:56The other thing that can be done to prevent this from opening up the floodgates of a lot
16:01of litigation is put caps on the damages.
16:05If you want to do non-economic damages, put caps on the amount of damages and cap the
16:10amount that attorneys can recover.
16:12If you do that, then you are totally disincentivizing, uh, frivolous lawsuits because they'll know
16:19there's a limited amount that an attorney is going to be able to recover.
16:23And if you think about it, if you have no caps on the non-economic damages, that is an incentive
16:30to bring a lot of cases and many of them probably won't be successful, uh, but even then you
16:37can probably get a settlement, um, again, even if you haven't done anything wrong, there's
16:42going to be an incentive to settle because it's very costly to go through with all this.
16:46And, and then of course, if you can get a jury to do a big, big victory, big verdict, then
16:51the lawyer's going to get a lot of the money there.
16:53And sometimes, you know, they're getting 30, 35% of what would be awarded, uh, to, to an
16:59individual client, uh, or, or in this case, um, uh, one of the, one of the relatives.
17:05So that will incentivize more, more lawsuits.
17:08I'm, I'm very much, um, convinced of that.
17:10So I told the legislature this going by and I know they did try to do, um, a cap on the
17:16non-economic damages.
17:18So they're opening that up, but capping it, uh, and then also limiting the amount that
17:22attorneys can recover.
17:23If you did that, I don't think you would see a major impact on the healthcare delivery
17:29system.
17:29I don't think you'd see a major impact on malpractice insurance rates.
17:34And I don't think you would see a major impact on access to care.
17:38But you know, the legislature did this years ago for a reason, because they were responding
17:42to something that was spiraling out of control.
17:45Uh, and I don't think that what they've proposed here, uh, is going to put us on the strong foot
17:51without these additional safeguards.
17:53So, uh, for that reason, I'm announcing that, that we will be vetoing that legislation.
17:59I have been in contact with some of the legislators, particularly in the Senate.
18:03I think the, the, the, the change to do the caps, uh, failed by one vote, uh, in the Florida
18:09Senate.
18:10And it was something that was, um, you know, there's some people that don't want to change
18:14this at all.
18:15But I think of those people, you know, that's something you can live with if you have some,
18:19some caps on it.
18:20So if you look around the country, Florida is a minority that says no recovery in these
18:25limited instances for non-economic damages, but almost, I mean, the vast majority of state have
18:32caps on what can be recovered in terms of non-economic damages.
18:38And if you don't have those caps, then you really are incentivizing a lot more litigation to take
18:43place in the state of Florida.
18:45None of that is free free lunch.
18:47Somebody will have to pay for it.
18:48Uh, and unfortunately, I think if this bill became law, I do think the cost would be borne,
18:54uh, by, uh, the, the physicians who would, would, would potentially flee the state to people that
19:01wouldn't have as much access to care, uh, and then also to the cost that would go up as a result of it.
19:07And, you know, we consulted a lot of folks that are involved in the healthcare sector,
19:12and I think it was pretty much, you know, unanimous that the way this current bill was structured,
19:17uh, would not have a positive impact, uh, on healthcare in Florida and could potentially
19:22have some really significant negative impacts on appreciate everybody that provided their
19:26feedback on this.
19:27Um, yeah, they were one vote away from, from doing something that I think was a little bit more, um,
19:33palpable for a lot of folks, but, but it just didn't end up working out that way.
19:36So I'm going to let some other folks talk, uh, and then we'll, uh, we'll take some questions.
19:40So we'll start with our surgeon general, uh, Dr. Joseph Latipo.
19:48Thanks governor.
19:52Good morning, everyone.
19:53Oh, there are more people in the room than I realized when I came in.
19:58Happy to see you guys.
19:58This is such a beautiful part of the state.
20:01Um, I have had the, the privilege of flying in with the governor this morning,
20:06and this, this part of the state is just, it's really, really gorgeous.
20:11So, you know, so the, we're talking about, uh, this legislation, the governors make a decision to,
20:17to veto it.
20:18And, you know, one of the things that I'm, you know, I appreciate the governor.
20:23I just, I like the guy a lot, but one of the things that I, I really admire, uh, about him,
20:28and a lot of other people do too.
20:30And it's part of major part of why he's been so successful is because he is able to demonstrate
20:36leadership.
20:37And, you know, you would think we have a lot of leaders, right?
20:40Leaders in name in this country, right?
20:42Every city's got them.
20:44Every county's got them.
20:45Every state's got them.
20:46You know, every country's got them.
20:48But unfortunately, there is, uh, there's such a shortage of leadership.
20:52It's like looking for water out in the middle of the, uh, Mojave Desert or something like that.
20:57There's just such little leadership out there.
21:00And it's, it is a travesty.
21:02And, you know, and what does leadership mean?
21:05Leadership means doing what you authentically believe is the right thing to do.
21:10And, you know, what is the right thing to do?
21:12Well, most people never actually answer that question who are leaders, right?
21:17So they do what most everyone else is doing.
21:20And they go the direction most everyone else is going.
21:23And, you know, the governor, I mean, I, I was very happy that Secretary Kennedy
21:27and, uh, and other members of HHS leadership, like Dr. Bhattacharya and Dr. Makari made the
21:34announcement that they would be pulling the COVID-19 mRNA COVID-19 vaccines from the childhood schedule.
21:41You know, in, in May, 2025, we finally had that announcement.
21:45And we made that announcement almost three years ago.
21:48And, and it was the right thing to do then.
21:50It's obviously the right thing to do now, uh, belatedly.
21:54But it was absolutely the right thing to do.
21:56And that's what leadership means.
21:58It means doing the right thing.
21:59And boy, you know, I don't know how many people remember that announcement.
22:02But we heard about it.
22:04I mean, we heard about, we heard about it, you know, quite extensively.
22:07I got, uh, many, many earfuls for a while about it.
22:10But it was the right thing to do.
22:11And it was a, it was something that the governor and I had discussed.
22:15And it was very clearly the right thing to do based on the evidence.
22:18And, you know, this is a different issue, but it's also the right thing to do.
22:22I, I, you know, I went to medical school.
22:24You know, I did my, I went to medical school at Harvard.
22:27I've been in the news a lot lately.
22:29And I did a doctoral degree there also, a PhD in research science.
22:33And, um, oh goodness, why the heck did I bring that up?
22:38Um, give me a second here.
22:39I, the, my thoughts are going to catch up with me in a moment.
22:43So, um, I can't remember why the heck I brought that up.
22:47So, so, so, um, I really can't remember.
22:52It's throwing me off.
22:52So, I, oh, no, I'm, no, that's not it.
22:56All right.
22:56So, um, so, you know, so with this, um, with this issue of the, of, of reforms and, and, and this,
23:07this veto decision, you know, so, you know, the, the, the lawmaker's right.
23:12So, I went to medical school because like that's my area.
23:15I'm, I'm a science guy.
23:17You know, I, it, it nourishes me.
23:18It energizes me.
23:19I like to do that.
23:20Uh, you know, I, my parents had mentioned law school to me when I was, when I was younger.
23:26And that was clearly, that was not the right direction for me.
23:28And I didn't, I didn't go that direction.
23:31So, so I, I, I'm cautious as I talk about legal things because it's not at all my thing.
23:36Like, I, I'm just absolutely not an expert in that area.
23:40But I've been reading about different policies that different states have in this area of tort.
23:46And it's a tough area, right?
23:48You know, heart goes out to, to patients and their family members.
23:51It's obviously very difficult.
23:53And, um, you know, as an aside, by the way, I'll share with you that, that the scientific research
23:59shows that probably one of the biggest predictors of lawsuits is unfortunately having terrible bedside
24:05manner.
24:06You know, doctors who patients by and large know that things don't always go well.
24:11And, you know, and, and most patients are actually very understanding as long as the physician is,
24:17is, is really has humility and humanism around it.
24:21But when doctors are jerks, that's when they get in trouble.
24:25That's, that's probably the biggest predictor of, of, of legal action.
24:30And, you know, that's a, that's an issue for the medical profession to work on.
24:34I mean, that's an, that's an important issue in the medical profession, undoubtedly.
24:38And, you know, many of us have seen many examples of poor bedside manner.
24:42But even that aside, this, the issue of justice, legal justice, you know, economic damages,
24:51non-economic damages, there simply isn't enough justice to go around and have the system be able
24:57to stand up on its two feet.
24:59It's just not possible.
25:00And the correct, I mean, the, the right thing to do, just the wise thing to do in that situation is to have caps.
25:09You just, I, it's in, it's, frankly, it's insane to have a system with no caps on non-economic damages
25:17and expect for that system to continue to sustain itself and, and function as, as it was intended to function,
25:24which is to provide care for patients.
25:26That's just not possible.
25:27And so let's, that's not, that's just, that has to be there.
25:31And, you know, unfortunately, we have the leadership of Governor DeSantis, who despite,
25:36I think actually there were, it was pretty much overwhelmingly passed from what I recall in the,
25:41in the news reports in the House and the Senate in terms of this bill.
25:46Unfortunately, it's not the, it's not the wisest decision.
25:49And I, I, again, I, you know, please lawmakers out there, forgive me.
25:53I did not go to, you know, I didn't go to, I didn't go to law school.
25:56But, you know, my sense, just scientifically, as a clinician, as just thinking about the issue,
26:01is that that's just, it's an unwise decision.
26:04It will hurt, undoubtedly, it will hurt the people of Florida.
26:08Like, there's, there's, it's just, it's, there's no gray in there.
26:12It's very black and white.
26:13It's going to hurt the people of Florida.
26:14It'll hurt the doctors.
26:16That'll trickle down to the patients.
26:17You better believe that doctors who are concerned about whether they're going to get sued
26:22provide different types of care.
26:24You better believe they do.
26:25Okay.
26:26And what you want is a doctor who is thinking about your interests when they're providing care for you,
26:32not about, you know, the risk of liability.
26:34That's, that's not, that's not, that's not what you want as a patient.
26:38So in addition to the reduction in really the, the type of care, the quality of the care,
26:44I don't mean it quality in an academic sense.
26:46I mean, like people want good care.
26:48And in addition to harming that, it's, it's going to make things even more expensive.
26:52And who needs that?
26:54I mean, this, this whole system is already just unrecognizable in terms of how,
27:00just how distorted it is.
27:02I mean, we, healthcare is so expensive in this country.
27:06And what do we get for, for it, right?
27:08We get like, you know, a bunch of paperwork, a bunch of systems and silos that don't talk to one another.
27:15You know, you know, heaven help you if you're sick.
27:18I mean, if, you know, hopefully you'll recover, but you know,
27:20are you ever going to make it through dealing with insurance companies?
27:23And, and like the doctor's offices and the different, you know, whatever your, your,
27:28your out of pocket is and whatever the coinsurance is and all of this junk,
27:33not to mention the mistakes that are made when, when insurance companies are and, and healthcare
27:39offices are making these calculations.
27:41It's a total mess.
27:43The last thing we need is just policies that make it worse.
27:48And you can't, you get, you have to cap this stuff.
27:50I mean, it's just, it's really insensible not to do that.
27:54So I'm glad the governor's making that decision.
27:56I personally, I believe it's the wise decision, the right decision for, for Floridians.
28:01I'm glad he's doing it.
28:02And so thank you.
28:04Look forward to hearing from the perspective of some of our other speakers.
28:16First, I want to welcome Governor DeSantis for being here today and
28:20welcome him to Lee Health and thank him for choosing Southwest Florida for this very,
28:25very important decision.
28:28I also want to thank Surgeon General Latipo.
28:31Thank you for being here and thanks to all of our distinguished guests here,
28:35especially our physicians and, and especially our physicians in training.
28:39We have physicians just beginning their careers now in residency programs.
28:42So thank you for being here and being a part of this.
28:43This is your future.
28:44We support this decision to veto this bill on many, many fronts, most of all access.
28:54We have an access challenge here in the state of Florida.
28:57We've all experienced it.
28:58And this is just a bill that will make that worse.
29:02We know that anything, any barrier that you put between patients and physicians and hospitals
29:10is, is not the right decision to make.
29:12And this bill is, does that.
29:14It will clearly increase costs.
29:16It'll affect emergency services.
29:18When you think about high risk specialties like obstetrics, emergency medicine,
29:23this is going to increase the cost.
29:24There's, there's no doubt about it.
29:26And it will be a deterrent to the one thing that is critical for all of us.
29:30And that's the recruitment of physicians to this state.
29:34We here at Lee Health, we are recruiting literally hundreds of, of, of physicians every year.
29:40And this is a deterrent.
29:41There are other places that people are going to want to go because of the risk of malpractice.
29:46And anything that increases that is not good policy and it's not smart.
29:52People here in Southwest Florida and throughout the state deserve better.
29:56They deserve a strong, sustainable health care system.
29:59And this, and this bill just simply doesn't do that.
30:02It's focused on legalities.
30:04It's focused on finance, but it's not focused on the patient.
30:07And I think we have to commend Governor DeSantis for putting patients first and saying,
30:13you know what, this is not right.
30:16And again, we may be in the minority in the, in the country on this, but we're in the right minority.
30:22So thank you.
30:22Thank you to Governor.
30:23Thank you for being here.
30:24This veto will protect our patients and access and help keep costs down.
30:30So thank you.
30:31And thanks for the opportunity.
30:38Good morning, everybody.
30:39Thank you, Governor.
30:41Appreciate it.
30:41I really appreciate the opportunity to share some comments with you all this morning on,
30:46you know, why I think that this veto is really important for our health care system here in Florida.
30:51You know, again, my name is Nick Panetta.
30:53I'm a surgeon in a large multi-specialty practice in Tampa.
30:56You know, every day I meet patients at some of the most vulnerable times in their lives,
31:02women fighting cancer, families navigating uncertainty, individuals facing decisions that they never imagined having to be faced with.
31:10You know, I can bet that most of us in this room, unfortunately, have found ourselves in that position,
31:14either dealing with an issue personally or helping a loved one or a family member through a challenging time.
31:19And because of that, I think we all know that behind each diagnosis is a real person and behind every treatment is a team committed,
31:27not just to achieving a good clinical outcome, but to really restoring that patient's dignity, hope, and quality of life.
31:33And I want to be really clear about something.
31:35You know, when patients are harmed through negligence, they deserve access to justice.
31:40And I think we've heard that commented on this morning.
31:42But when there is real pain and there is real loss, that can't be ignored.
31:47But we must always hold ourselves as health care providers accountable to the highest standards of care.
31:53But accountability has to come and must exist within a framework that preserves access for all of us, right?
32:00Not just those with a means to pursue litigation.
32:02That's why today's veto really, really matters.
32:05If signed into law, HB 6017 would have really dismantled a carefully collaborated policy
32:11that strikes a necessary balance in Florida's medical liability system.
32:15Would it expanded non-economic damages in ways that, you know, kind of while emotionally are resonant,
32:21they can carry very real consequences to the health care system.
32:24And removing these guardrails invites a significant increase in litigation, as we've heard.
32:29Much of it speculative, which in turn is going to drive up malpractice premiums significantly.
32:34And those costs don't just stop with the providers.
32:36They ripple outward.
32:37They're affecting availability and affordability of care across our state.
32:41We're already grappling, as we've heard again, with a huge physician shortage.
32:45Population is growing.
32:46There just aren't enough bricks and mortar and docks to care for all the people that need good quality care.
32:51And this bill would have really made that problem worse.
32:54Particularly, that would apply in high-risk specialties like obstetrics and surgery.
32:59And unfortunately, it would be especially applicable if passed hurting communities in the rural and underserved areas.
33:05For many patients, it's not just about the cost of their health care.
33:08It's about whether a doctor is really available to care for them at all.
33:11So we want families to feel confident that justice is accessible.
33:15But what we really want is also for every Floridian to be able to access care without fear of delay or fear of price barriers that may exist.
33:24So, Governor DeSantis, I want to sincerely thank you for your leadership in protecting that balance.
33:29This veto is not about denying compassion.
33:33It's about preserving access, retaining talent that we badly need in the state of Florida,
33:37and ensuring that Florida remains a state where both patients and physicians can thrive.
33:41So thank you all very much for the opportunity.
33:49Good morning.
33:50My name is Andy Bolin.
33:51I'm a medical malpractice defense attorney here in the state of Florida.
33:54So I represent doctors and nurses and health care providers throughout the state against these medical malpractice cases.
34:02I want to thank Governor DeSantis for his incredible leadership in this tort reform arena over the past several years.
34:09Florida has become a place, because of litigation, that is unfriendly to the health care community.
34:17We've seen any protections that were available to physicians, including caps on non-economic damages either be eroded or completely erased by our courts.
34:27And every single day, I represent physicians and watch them grapple with the impact of being sued in medical malpractice cases,
34:37where they have support by other experts, where they have good, well-reasoned basis for their care.
34:47And it's important for everyone to understand that just because there's a negative outcome doesn't mean that there's malpractice.
34:55But unfortunately, so often in our cases, what we see is that the plaintiff's bar starts with the outcome of the case,
35:03as opposed to the actual care of the case.
35:05These cases are very sad.
35:08They're very emotional.
35:09And your heart goes out to every single plaintiff that brings a case.
35:13They understandably, they have an emotional response to the outcome of the case.
35:19But it doesn't always mean that there's malpractice.
35:21And our clients are now facing sort of unprecedented times.
35:25I'm a Florida native.
35:26I've practiced in this area for 23 years.
35:30And I can tell you that right now, our physicians are facing the highest medical malpractice insurance premiums
35:36in the United States of America.
35:38Also, when you look at studies that talk about severity, which is a term that speaks to whether or not
35:45or how much it costs to resolve cases, how much juries are awarding in cases,
35:50Florida's in the unenviable spot of being at the top of that list as well.
35:54So what Governor DeSantis has done with this bill is no small thing.
35:58It's very, very important that and I appreciate his careful analysis of it,
36:03because as I've said, it's an emotional issue.
36:05There's no doubt that there are people that have suffered malpractice.
36:11But it is certainly in my in my experience,
36:14the minority of patients who bring cases that have experienced that.
36:19And so my my clients are are not interested in seeing bad doctors protected.
36:25They're they're for accountability.
36:27But as has been said before, we need to make sure that we're doing it in a way that balances the system,
36:32that brings fairness and equality to the system so that we can protect access to care.
36:38This this issue as to access of care, my clients and people like my clients who came and they talked
36:45in front of the committees that that considered this bill up in Tallahassee.
36:50And they talked about the challenges of physician recruitment and retaining physicians
36:54in the state of Florida in past sessions.
36:57This isn't the first time this bill has been debated in past sessions.
37:00We had folks that came from places like Texas that said one of their tactics in recruiting physicians
37:06away from places like Florida is to point out that they have caps on damages
37:11and that it's a it's a safer it's a it's a better tort environment for them.
37:15You know, not only am I an attorney, but I'm also a consumer.
37:18I want my doctors making medical decisions based on what's best for my medical care,
37:23not practicing defensive medicine, ordering tests that may not be necessary simply because
37:28they don't want to face the question later of why didn't you order this unnecessary test.
37:33The access to care situation is not something that's it's theoretical in the state of Florida right
37:39now the March of Dimes put out a study publicly available where there are counties in Florida
37:44where there are no hospitals birthing centers or physicians that offer obstetrical care in the
37:49state of Florida doesn't seem possible. So we need to make sure that we're doing everything we can
37:56to to engage physicians to make sure that we have physicians that are not only going to be able to
38:03provide access to care, but that they're making decisions based on the quality of care.
38:07So again, on behalf of my clients, Governor DeSantis, I thank you for your leadership on this issue.
38:11And I look forward to working with lawmakers in the coming sessions to try and put together a bill
38:16that accomplishes what they're looking for, but also provides those reciprocal protections to the
38:21physicians in this state. Because I think we we have some of the the best leaders in the state
38:28in the country right here in the state of Florida. So thank you very much again.
38:38Well, I appreciate everybody's comments and and their thoughtfulness. And again, you know,
38:44this legislation, you know, doesn't impact what are probably the more usual situations that, you know,
38:50if you have a medical malpractice with a surviving spouse, bill didn't address that. Minor, minor children,
38:57bill doesn't address that. It's really this kind of unique, it's not unique, but probably less
39:02prevalent where you have someone that's over the age of 25 and is and is independent that the
39:08legislature in the past has said you can sue for economic damage. You know, people acted like you
39:13couldn't sue at all when this bill was being done. That's not true. You could sue and recover economic
39:18damages on behalf of that family member. But the legislature previously had limited the non economic
39:25damages. And I think the reality is, is just because that would have invited a lot of lawsuits,
39:30and it would have caused more, more costs on the system. If you have caps, you can disincentivize
39:38the litigate first mentality. But I do think that we want accountability. It does not need to be in the
39:45form of a lawsuit all the time. In fact, you know, having regulatory and professional accountability,
39:51you know, be swift, that probably would be more of a deterrent for negligent physicians than,
39:57than what this bill seeks to accomplish. And so I'm all for that. But if you are going to unwind what
40:03was done 30, 40 years ago, and do this non economic damages in these two limited circumstances,
40:10you got to have caps on the amounts and you got to have caps on the attorney's fees. That will protect
40:17the access to care will protect the cost from spiraling out of control. It will make it so that
40:24we can still recruit and maintain physicians. And so they came close to doing that. They didn't quite
40:29get it over over the finish line. But I think for all the reasons that people have said, that as
40:34currently constructed, this bill would have a lot of negative impacts in a variety of ways across our
40:40health care system. Okay. Anybody have any questions? So on this on the UF presidential,
40:58you know, I appoint people to the boards of trustees and the board of governors. And and they do these
41:04searches and they they bring in candidates. And so with the respect for the University of Florida,
41:10I don't know the candidate. There's he was the president University of Michigan, which is usually
41:16considered one of the top public universities in America. And he wants to come to Florida. Now people
41:22have pointed out a lot of statements that he has made that are not exactly what we're looking for
41:29in a state where woke goes to die. And I cringe at some of these statements. And but basically,
41:35I think the folks that were involved in the search, after having interviewed him, spent time with him,
41:40it's their judgment that that that he's really kind of reached the limit on the the campus leftism.
41:47And he would want to leave Michigan where that is prevalent to Florida, where it's frowned upon,
41:52because he he wants to be more in line with what Florida is doing and our policies. And they really
41:57believe that now there's other folks that haven't necessarily talked to him, they see all these,
42:01and they're like, yeah, can't you can't do it. So he's going to go in front of the board of governors,
42:05and I appointed all those folks. And so so they'll make the judgment. But but people are saying, well,
42:09well, you know, you know, you could have a woke here. No, no, no, no, that's not going to happen.
42:14Because if he were to go in and do that, he will lose his job in Florida, we have expectations
42:21about what we want in higher education. We don't want it to be a fountain of activism or leftist
42:28indoctrination. And if you go in that direction, then you will not have support to continue. And so
42:34either way, we will continue to have a higher education system that's really leading the way.
42:41Our expectations are clear, not only in law, which we have, such as by eliminating DE&I,
42:47but also in other actions that we have taken. And those expectations will need to be met one way
42:53or another. When we had the Hamas stuff breaking out across the country, and you had this stuff at
42:58Columbia University, all these other places, people said, oh, man, you know, it's not happening in
43:03Florida. I wonder why? Well, it wasn't a mystery why. If a president of a university in Florida allowed
43:09that to happen, they would no longer be the president of a university in the state of Florida. It's just that
43:15simple. So we have expectations for it. But you know, I've appointed these people to do their job.
43:22I wasn't, you know, I wasn't the one that that picked the candidate or this or that. You know,
43:28it's my view is like, let them do their job, let the process unfold. But however it works out,
43:34you know, we will continue on the direction that we will one way or another.
43:38We are going to protect the innocence of our children. Why? Why would it be problematic to say
43:58you can't do this stuff that's that's sexually explicit in front of minors? That used to not
44:06even be something that would be questioned. Now somehow you have folks going in the court and
44:11they really want to push the envelope on this stuff. And I want Florida to be family friendly.
44:17We fought the fight about the schools with the edge of particularly for the young grades about
44:23are you going to be like California where you port to second grade and you're not you're not learning
44:29in math or English, you're learning about changing genders. That's unacceptable. And we laid down the
44:37marker here. So parents in Florida should should know that we're on their side. And these kids should
44:46should not be not be robbed of their innocence. So when you have some of this stuff where you'd have
44:50these establishments where you could have minors in there. And that's not consistent with with good
44:56policy. So we stand for the protection of the children and we're going to continue to do that.
45:01With the state budget still in limbo, are you concerned that this sales tax holiday be effective?
45:07You know, a lot of people take advantage. Well, it already has been effective. I mean,
45:10you remember I proposed a second amendment tax holiday that was supposed to start on Memorial Day weekend.
45:17So you would have had a lot of folks that would have been able to go out and bought ammunition,
45:21bought firearms and not had to pay any tax on it. Now, we're still going to, I think, get that enacted,
45:28but it will be over a different period of time. And so, you know, you only have one job,
45:34real job in the legislature, and that's to do the appropriations and to do the budget, you know,
45:40the policy changes, you can do it, but you're not required to change any policy, you're not required
45:46to pass new laws. A lot of times they pass laws that it's not like new, more laws or better laws,
45:52right? I mean, as we as we've seen. So that's the one thing that they're supposed to do. They ended
45:58at the beginning of May without really much of a way forward. It's not clear to me that they have a
46:04better way forward. I have opinions on why that is. And at the appropriate time, you'll hear me
46:11articulating those. But yeah, I mean, you should have already had sales tax relief. And that's
46:19something that's meaningful to a lot of Floridians. You know, when you say you're not going to have to
46:23do any sales tax, if you're making purchases that are, you know, hundreds of dollars, sometimes even
46:30more than that, I mean, that adds up pretty quickly. And that's helpful for people. So we need to do that.
46:35We need to continue doing the holidays we do. We're just starting hurricane season,
46:40why are why would we not want to do disaster preparedness holidays, so you can load up
46:45tax free on what you need in case now look, knock on wood, hopefully we get a respite from hurricane
46:50this year. And in reality, you know, they do kind of come in bunches. And sometimes you'll have them
46:55several years, you don't have any. So hopefully we get into into a respite here. But we can't assume
47:02that we've got to prepare as if we're going to have people have really used that in big ways. We also
47:07proposed a summer tax holiday on marine fuel, people want to go boating and go fit, you get
47:13the fuel tax free, you know, that's something that was very popular people want to do, of course,
47:17we do back to school tax holidays, which are good for parents and on and on. So we should just keep
47:24doing that. It's been something that's been successful. And then you know, what I've been saying
47:28is, we don't have an income tax, we have one of the lowest per capita tax burdens for for state,
47:36if not the lowest in the country, certainly one of the lowest three or four. But what people are
47:43saying with tax is local property tax relief, that's what people want. You know, I propose to do relief
47:50this year, leading into next year, where we're going to put it on the ballot. So that you know,
47:54we can just assure people actually own their homes, and that they don't have to pay rent to the
48:00government for their entire existence. That's not the way this was supposed to be. And honestly,
48:06I think it would be huge for the state of Florida. And I think policy wise, it would it would have very
48:13positive context, you know, some people complain about, and I understandably, they'll complain about,
48:19you know, some of these like big companies buying up a lot of homes, right, and they want people to
48:24rent, it raises the price. Well, if you do tax property tax, where individual residents don't
48:31have to pay tax, but the investors still have to, that's a way to really blunt that that's going to
48:36make a home ownership more affordable for or more attractive for, you know, working people who want
48:42that's their primary residence, it's not going to be as attractive for speculators. So there's a lot of
48:46great things that can happen from that. But but we got to get it done. And we got to get it done
48:52in a really resounding way. So I know that the voters have been very clear about what they want.
48:57I want to see I want to see a down payment this year. And then I want to see this on the ballot in
49:032026. And you know, you guys are going to be able to have an opportunity potentially to vote for
49:09something that's going to be really, really big. And here's the thing, you absolutely can structure it
49:14in a way where all the things that people want can still be done. Don't let them tell you,
49:19you're not going to have a police department on this. That's not true. Ask them how much their
49:24budgets have grown administratively over the last three or four at the county. And I mean, it's a lot
49:29right. So there's a lot that you can do. And I just think it's such a great opportunity to be able to
49:35get this done. But if you think about Florida, and what we've done, so right now, we have the second
49:41lowest per capita spending levels in the country. And that's, you know, significant. New York has
49:50three million fewer people than we do their budgets over twice the size of our budget. We have the
49:55smallest number of state government workers per capita in the entire country. If you look at all
50:01of Florida's debt over 180 years of as a state, just since I've been governor, we've paid down 41% and
50:08counting and doing more. We have the lowest per capita debt state debt of any state in the United
50:14States. Your share as a Florida resident of our state, that's about $400. Your share of the federal debt
50:21as a US citizen is over $105,000. Theirs is escalating, ours is declining. So we have managed this
50:31exceptionally well working with the legislature. Look, I've had to veto spending. One year, I vetoed 3% of the
50:37budget. Some years I don't do as much. It just depends on what's put in front of me. But we've done
50:42that while also doing record investments in things like Everglades restoration. We're going to open the
50:50sea, the reservoir over here in southwest Florida, I think probably next month. That's going to be huge.
50:59You remember in 2018, they had all these discharges from Lake Okeechobee. Now the Army Corps does it. It's not
51:05the state. You know, I wasn't governor yet, but we've come in and we built all this infrastructure. We
51:09have things flowing well, water quality improved. We put huge resources behind that because that's
51:14what people wanted to see. And that's the right thing for the state. We've accelerated road projects
51:19and infrastructure projects. Now you guys don't do I-4 as much down here. We just opened a temporary
51:25lane expansion in Polk County area. Huge cut to the commute times. And then when the whole project's done,
51:32it's going to be amazing. We've put money into that. We've raised, gave money for teacher salary
51:38increases to the school districts, billions of dollars over the last three or four years. So
51:43we're doing these big things. We're cutting taxes, paying down debt, having a very responsible budget.
51:50And so that is not the type of scenario where you would expect a budget impasse. Like literally,
51:58if you can't agree, just copy and paste what we've been doing. This is not rocket science. And I think
52:04that I think that there's reasons why it's gotten to this point. But we're going to have to get this
52:10done. We're going to have to do it for the state of Florida. And we're certainly not going to let the
52:15progress be derailed. Okay. Thanks, everybody. God bless you.
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