Georgia’s 2025 tort reform — Senate Bill 68 (SB 68) — represents one of the most sweeping overhauls of personal injury law in decades. The most impactful change centers on how medical bills, health insurance payments, premiums, and liens can be used as evidence in personal injury cases.
These changes will significantly alter the value of personal injury claims and how juries calculate damages. Below is a clear, plain-English breakdown of what happened, why it matters, and how it may affect injured Georgians moving forward.
The Upshot: Despite Tort Reform, we intend to follow the harm and update and supplement as we see how this plays out more in court.
- What Was the Law Before? (The Collateral Source Rule)
For decades, Georgia followed the collateral source rule, which protected injured people by prohibiting juries from hearing evidence that someone else—like a health insurer—paid or discounted the plaintiff’s medical bills. That meant juries heard only the full billed charges, not the deeply discounted insurance rates.
Under the old rule, juries could not consider:
- Health insurance payments
- Medicaid or Medicare adjustments
- Workers’ compensation payments
- Discounts or write-offs
- Any other third-party payments
This rule ensured negligent drivers and defendants didn’t get a discount simply because the injured person had health insurance.
- What Did the 2025 Tort Reform Change?
SB 68 erases much of the collateral source rule for incidents occurring after the law took effect.
New Code Section: O.C.G.A. § 51-12-1.1
SB 68 creates a new statute, O.C.G.A. § 51-12-1.1, which dramatically changes how medical bills are proven in court:
- Medical damages (“special damages”) are now limited to the reasonable value of medically necessary care — not the full billed amount.
- Juries may now hear:
- Amounts actually paid by health insurance or workers’ compensation
- Letters of protection (LOPs) or lien-based treatment, which are now discoverable and open to attack
This is the first time in Georgia history that insurance payments — previously barred — can be shown to a jury.
- What Does This Mean in Plain English?
Before Tort Reform:
A hospital bills $50,000.
Insurance quietly pays $12,000.
The jury hears $50,000.
After Tort Reform:
The jury hears $50,000 AND $12,000, plus what you paid in premiums, deductibles, and co-pays.
Automobile insurance companies love this change because health insurers almost always pay less than the sticker price of medical care. Now the auto insurers get to highlight those discounts in front of the jury.
- Why Did Lawmakers Say They Did This?
Supporters of the bill claim:
- Juries should see the “real numbers.”
- It will reduce “excessive” verdicts.
- It will create predictability for insurance companies.
Whether these goals will actually play out remains to be seen. What is clear is that insurance companies lobbied aggressively for this change, and they stand to benefit immediately. It’s worth noting that the claimed rationale for the law, reduced auto insurance premiums and less “frivolous” lawsuits, were not actually supported by studies or real numbers put forth by the insurance lobbies.
Georgians should keep an eye on this to see IF AUTO INSURANCE RATES DROP IN THE YEARS AHEAD???
Opponents warned that the law shifts financial burden away from negligent drivers and onto injured victims and their health insurers, penalizing people simply because they carried health insurance.
- How Will This Affect Personal Injury Cases?
- Lower Medical Special Damages
Because juries will now see the lower insurance-negotiated rates:
- Medical damage values will drop — sometimes drastically.
- Plaintiffs may recover far less than the true cost of their medical treatment.
This hits hardest in hospital-based care, where billed charges can be 3–10x the insurance payment.
- Pain and Suffering Takes Center Stage
With medical specials pushed downward:
- Pain and suffering becomes even more important.
- Insurance companies will try to anchor damages to the lowest possible medical figure — usually the discounted rate.
Attorneys will need to put more emphasis on the human impact of injuries.
- Letters of Protection (LOPs) Under Attack
LOPs — often used by uninsured clients — are now open to attack:
- Defense lawyers will argue LOP charges are inflated.
- But many injured people have no access to care without an LOP, or treating on a lien, and medical providers are not paid for months or years while a case resolves.
Juries will now need to evaluate medical bills in context, including why a patient needed lien-based care in the first place and what their overall circumstances and ability to get care are.
- More Complex Trials
Plaintiffs’ lawyers must now be prepared to:
- Prove why certain charges are the true “reasonable value”
- Address medical billing practices
- Address how this new statute interacts with older collateral source rule doctrines
Trials will become more technical and more expensive.
- Practical Effect on Injured Georgians
- Less Money for Medical Bills
Even if you paid premiums for years, the defendant now benefits from your insurance discounts. In essence:
You did the right thing by buying insurance — and now the negligent driver (and AUTO INSURANCE COMPANIES) gets the discount.
- More Out-of-Pocket Risk
If your health insurer has subrogation rights, it may have to be repaid from a recovery.
With reduced overall settlements, your insurer's reimbursement claim may take a larger share of your settlement, leaving you with less.
- Lower Settlement Offers
Insurance companies have already begun using SB 68 to justify lower offers across the board, increasing the number of lawsuits being filed.
Ironically, although proponents claimed tort reform would reduce litigation, we are already seeing more lawsuits, not fewer — because low offers expose at-fault drivers to being sued.
- Hardest Hit: Cases with Large Medical Bills
Injuries requiring substantial treatment — surgeries, hospitalizations, trauma care — will now face significant reductions.
Insurance companies will claim the “reasonable value” is whatever they paid, even when the actual cost of care is far higher.
Conclusion
Georgia’s 2025 tort reform dramatically changes how personal injury cases are valued. By letting juries hear insurance payments and limiting medical damages to the so-called “reasonable value” of care, SB 68:
- Hurts injured plaintiffs by reducing recoverable damages
- Rewards auto insurance companies
- Complicates the process of proving medical bills
- Encourages more litigation, not less
For injured Georgians, this likely means lower settlement offers, tougher negotiations, and a greater risk that your own health insurer will demand a larger slice of any recovery.
As courts interpret this new law and its many gray areas, these changes will continue to evolve — but their impact is being felt right now for anyone injured after SB 68 became law.
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