Health Care not for the health of the STATES

Supreme Court of the United States ^ | March 30, 2010 | Stevens, J.

[mikemoose]

In a decision published March 30, 2010 (see link), the SCOTUS limited the grounds on which some whistle-blower cases are filed. In particular, in a 7-2 decision (Breyer and Sotomayor, dissenting), the majority held that the statute prohibited suits based on information already public "in a congressional, administrative or Government Accounting Office report, hearing, audit or investigation", stating that this section also prohibited suits against States as well.

Now the interesting part...as part of our new health care reform, contained in the bill is a modification of the whistle-blower statute that now limits the section defined by today's decision to only the Federal Gov't, thus opening the States to numerous and costly lawsuits.

Obviously health care is not for the health of the States. Where are our Governors?

[Anti-Hillary]

Okay, what does this all mean???

[mikemoose]

It means that the Federal Government through the health care reform act has done away with a safe harbor for the States in the whistle-blower statute.

[Monorprise]

So your saying this is not suits looking for information already publicly available?

[mikemoose]

What the health care bill has done is opened the States up to lawsuits where information is already publicly available. So even though the SCOTUS has decided publicly available information cannot be used as the basis of a lawsuit, as of the date of the health care act the suits against the States can be based on publicly available information.