MovieChat Forums > Puncture (2012) Discussion > Questions, spoilers

Questions, spoilers

posted 13 years ago by nick-1036
4 replies | jump to latest

How do you get aids on your job because your company refuses to pay for a safe needle and you can't sue for millions? Then you die young leaving your kid penniless? It makes no sense when they told her she had no basis for a lawsuit, they were wrong.

So they won 150 million, who got that money, the safe needle inventor and the lawyers, and no one else? No one who was harmed got any money? Then, "some" hospitals started buying the more expensive safer needle, but the majority still don't? How is that a win, that's an epic fail.

The movie, and the resolution was a downer, we're doomed by other people's greed.

[–] Grizzly101 13 years ago

According to the New York Times (http://tinyurl.com/7r6lqo5) the anti-trust settlement against Becton Dickinson ("United Medical Group" in the movie) was for $100 million. Also, the $100 million settlement figure is pre-tax; the post-tax figure is $63 million (Source: Becton Dickinson, http://tinyurl.com/6lodhu5). Three other defendents sued by the plaintiff ("Safety Point" in the movie, Retractable Technologies Inc. or RTI) paid additional damages of $50 million.

According to an interview with Forbes Small Business magazine from 2005 (Source: http://tinyurl.com/7lllrns), RTI CEO Thomas Shaw plans to use the $150 million settlement money to finance manufacturing outsourcing operations in China and other efforts to drive down costs for his company's safety needles. In Shaw's view, his "revenge" will be producing a safety needle that is competitive on costs vs Becton Dickinson, the market leader in the US $1 billion/year syringe market.

There are no problems that cannot be solved with a can of brake clean and a lighter

[–] scion9 9 years ago

Way late response, but they weren't wrong. She could have gotten something but not much. The maximum value you can get from a lawsuit of this variety is prescribed. Workman's compensation is being paid, and you can get additional damages which is a set value based on the injury. A missing finger is worth X amount, a missing eye Y amount. It's all shockingly low. Big injury suits happen when people are injured in unconventional ways, they aren't even technically legally working at the time, et cetera. A nurse getting accidentally stuck by a needle while clocked in, performing routine duties is not one of those situations.

[–] fan1982 9 years ago

The safety needle was not even made until after the nurse stuck herself, so in her case, there was no negligence on the hospitals part. Her reason for the suit was to prevent it from happening again, now that her father's friend invented the safety needle.

[–] psalmverse6-844-865746 9 years ago

You said it,Nick. And we ARE doomed. Because, we live in a world of greedy people who care nothing about the welfare and the lives of others. Yup, you said it, Nick.