In 1995 it was reported that charges of reckless homicide had been brought against a medical laboratory that had been accused of misreading Pap smears of two women who later died of cervical cancer. The case was the first in the USA in which a laboratory had been charged with a crime because of an error.
In 1999 it was reported that medical mistakes killed from 44,000-98,000 people each year in the USA, of which 7,000 were caused by medication errors.