March Madness article

(I asked Thom Stevens) who lobbies for several medical associations, if in basketball terms, there was sufficient contact during the incident to draw a foul. He said, yes, for a personal foul, maybe not a technical foul.)

Witnesses siding with the optometrists contend that Robinson merely put his hands up as Minardi got into his face arguing over the bill.

For his part, Robinson said he was offended that, during the subcommittee meeting, Minardi told delegates that optometrists have less medical training than John King, the notorious osteopath who racked up more than 120 malpractice claims during his tenure at Putnam General.

Robinson said he told Minardi that he thought comparing optometrists to King was inappropriate and insulting, which led to the exchange.

Bottom line, though, is that because of the incident, the already controversial issue is too hot for legislators to touch this session, and the bill will most likely be assigned to a legislative interim committee to study over the next year.

Clearly, it’s a tough issue, since laser eye surgery is a very lucrative practice, and ophthalmologists don’t want others cutting into their business. On the other hand, it’s probably not good public policy to let people without adequate training shoot lasers into people’s eyes.