Doctors regret MERS lawsuit

Medical doctors Friday expressed their frustrations to family members of the Middle East respiratory syndrome victims who have been filing a string of lawsuits, saying that they did their best to contain the virus.

At a parliamentary committee meeting on MERS, directors of the virus-hit hospitals testified that they also felt disappointed over the growing public criticism questioning their MERS containment efforts.

“To be honest, I feel devastated,” said Park Chang-il, the director of Konyang University Hospital in Daejeon, which was sued by family members of MERS victims Wednesday. “Even though my hospital is a private one, all of the staff set hospital management aside and did their best to contain the virus as much as the public hospitals.”

On Wednesday, a local civic group filed three cases against the government, municipalities and hospitals on behalf of the bereaved family members of patients No. 45 and No. 173 and three uninfected family members, who were all forced into isolation. The family members want compensation for physical and mental damages caused by the virus outbreak, said the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice, a Seoul-based advocacy group for citizens’ rights. It is the first legal case being filed by virus victims’ family members.

The plaintiffs claimed that the government and hospitals failed to block the spread of the virus and kept crucial information on MERS patients confidential, all while being aware that MERS was infectious. The government also violated its duty to protect the public from the danger, they added.

“The MERS crisis clearly proves that the state’s epidemic control system and the private hospital management system have collapsed,” said CCEJ Secretary General Ko Gye-hyun. “I hope the lawsuit not only protects the victims' rights, but also tightens the government’s responsibility for health and antivirus measures.”

The 173rd patient, who contracted the virus from the 76th patient in a hospital in the eastern capital, died two days after she was officially diagnosed with MERS.

“If the quarantine system was well prepared, there wouldn’t have been a super-spreader and my mother wouldn't have to get infected,” said the son of the 173rd patient in the press conference Thursday.

The bereaved family members of the 173rd patient and 45th patient will seek 100 million won ($88,000) and 300 million won in compensation, respectively, the civic group said. The quarantined family members will seek 6.7 million won in compensation.

The amounts to be compensated were determined based on the actual income of the victims, it added.

The CCEJ said it would consider filing additional compensation suits as more requests were submitted from those affected by the MERS crisis.

The Welfare Ministry said that it does not have any particular subsidy plans for the MERS victims, aside from 13 million won of financial support for funerals and cremations.

As of Friday afternoon, no additional cases of MERS had been reported for five consecutive days, keeping the number of confirmed cases at 186. The death toll also remained unchanged at 35.

By Lee Hyun-jeong (rene@heraldcorp.com)