Pandemic Guidelines, Not Changed Malpractice Rules, Are the Right Response to COVID-19
Document Type
Article
Year
2020
Citation Information
Govind Persad, Govind C. Persad, and Wendy Netter Epstein, Pandemic Guidelines, Not Changed Malpractice Rules, Are the Right Response to COVID-19, (2020), available at https://scholar.law.colorado.edu/faculty-articles/2044.
Abstract
We agree with Dr. Faust that cities and states should work to alleviate doctors’ uncertainty about malpractice liability when providing appropriate medical care to patients during the COVID-19 pandemic.
But they should do that not by redefining malpractice, like New York State did this week, but by activating and publicizing pandemic response plans, like New York State’s 2015 Ventilator Allocation Guidelines, which authorize the prioritization of patients for scarce resources based on their capacity to benefit from treatment.