In addition to $24 million in compensatory damages, a Nevada jury has ruled that two units of UnitedHealth Group must also pay $500 million in punitive damages to two plaintiffs who contracted hepatitis C from an in-network physician, according to a Bloomberg Law report.
Jurors decided on the punitive damages yesterday, making the total $524 million award the largest in the U.S. so far this year.
The jury ruled that Health Plan of Nevada and Sierra Health Services improperly monitored Dipak Desai, MD, a former gastroenterologist who has been blamed for infecting patients after he reused vials of anesthesia and failed to sterilize equipment. The plaintiffs' contractions were part of a 2007 outbreak, in which Nevada officials notified 50,000 patients they may have been infected with hepatitis C from Dr. Desai's practice.
A spokesperson for Minnetonka, Minn.-based UnitedHealth said the $500 million award "has no grounding whatsoever in reality," according to the report, and that it "represents fantasy damages, not punitive damages."
An attorney for one plaintiff encouraged jurors to bring forth a large punitive award to send a message to payors, according to the report. Robert Eglet, JD, said the verdict should be "loud enough to hear from Las Vegas to Wall Street" and should prompt payors' attention to the quality of services provided by physicians in their health plans, according to the report.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs originally asked jurors to award a total of $2.5 billion in punitive damages. That would represent roughly 15 percent of UnitedHealth's profits, an amount an attorney for the company said would "destroy us," according to the report.
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Jurors decided on the punitive damages yesterday, making the total $524 million award the largest in the U.S. so far this year.
The jury ruled that Health Plan of Nevada and Sierra Health Services improperly monitored Dipak Desai, MD, a former gastroenterologist who has been blamed for infecting patients after he reused vials of anesthesia and failed to sterilize equipment. The plaintiffs' contractions were part of a 2007 outbreak, in which Nevada officials notified 50,000 patients they may have been infected with hepatitis C from Dr. Desai's practice.
A spokesperson for Minnetonka, Minn.-based UnitedHealth said the $500 million award "has no grounding whatsoever in reality," according to the report, and that it "represents fantasy damages, not punitive damages."
An attorney for one plaintiff encouraged jurors to bring forth a large punitive award to send a message to payors, according to the report. Robert Eglet, JD, said the verdict should be "loud enough to hear from Las Vegas to Wall Street" and should prompt payors' attention to the quality of services provided by physicians in their health plans, according to the report.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs originally asked jurors to award a total of $2.5 billion in punitive damages. That would represent roughly 15 percent of UnitedHealth's profits, an amount an attorney for the company said would "destroy us," according to the report.
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