The Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA) of 1975 was a statute enacted by the California Legislature in September 1975[1] (and signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown in September), which was intended to lower medical malpractice liability insurance premiums for healthcare providers in that state by decreasing their potential tort liability.
MICRA's stated justification, in turn, was to keep healthcare providers as a whole financially solvent, thus lowering the cost of healthcare services and increasing their availability. MICRA's constitutionality was repeatedly challenged during the 1970s and 1980s, but most of it was eventually upheld as constitutional under rational basis review by the Supreme Court of California or the California Courts of Appeal.[2] Almost all of MICRA is still in effect and still part of California law, though many of its provisions were updated in 2022 by AB 35.