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Reform would streamline compensation to victims
Vanderbilt University Professor of Law Richard Nagareda says the asbestos reform litigation backed by the president and expected to be debated in the U.S. Senate as early as next week “would mark a huge step forward for litigation reform in this country. There is broad, bipartisan recognition that lawsuits over asbestos have exerted a crushing burden on the court system and on American business,” he said. “It would be one thing if all this litigation was doing a good job in delivering money to those who are actually suffering from asbestos-related disease, but it isn’t. The proposed legislation would take these lawsuits out of the courts and put them into an administrative system that would apply sensible medical criteria to focus our limited dollars on the people who need it most.”
Nagareda is the author of the forthcoming book Mass Torts in a World of Settlement. To speak with him, call 615-322-5250 or e-mail richard.nagareda@law.vanderbilt.edu. After hours, call 615-322-2706.
Media contact: Susanne Hicks, (615) 322-NEWS
susanne.hicks@vanderbilt.edu