More than half of the states have placed limits on the amounts of money that people can recover in medical malpractice lawsuits to institute tort reform. Within the federal system, there are caps on the amount of punitive awards that people can recover after the U.S. Supreme Court limited them to no more than nine times the amount of compensatory awards that are awarded to a plaintiff in State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. v. Campbell, 538 U.S. 408 (2003).
While many other states have state caps on monetary awards in medical error and personal injury cases, Arizona does not. Under Ariz. Const. Art. 2, § 31, the state is not allowed to pass a law limiting the amount of money that can be awarded in a civil action for the death or injury of a person. This constitutional provision means that Arizona cannot pass statutory caps on medical malpractice awards.