My father was in the Australian Health Insurance Commission, and saw the stats decades ago in Oz.
10-20 times the road toll, and not missed/misdiagnosis...death due to the "correct" application of current treatments, and just plain negligence.
They didn't get to number 3 because the others dropped, they are there and ignored.
http://www.medicalerroraustralia.com/
Cases that I'm aware of
* guy went in to have a lung removed. Surgeon severed the aorta on the common side, not on the dieseased lung side, murdering him basically...family was told that they knew the risks going in, it was risky surgery, and the patient didn't make it.
* not life threatenting, but hung over surgeon doing a knee cartilage trim got the loud pedal jammed under something, and destroyed a guy's knee on the inside, requiring reconstruction...patient was told that it was "worse in there than we thought"
* my parents have been called in half a dozen times to "say goodbye" to my sister after surgery. Each time, they have flattly ignored the admission sheet that she suffers anyphalaxis when exposed to latex...she has her own anesthetist these days, who having seen her nearly die on the table looks after that side of her care.
* bloke in the rifle club was in a really bad way (diabetese complications) when some bright spark decided to grind his oral medication into a powder and inject it.
* Neighbour's wife in nursing home was overmedicated due to a cross up in the number/frequency of a couple of her drugs.
The ones on the table have been given to me by a theater nurse who has seen many deaths on the table due to mess-ups..."they didn't pull through" is all the families get. Requires a whistle blower in the theatre to get action, and whose going to listen to a scrub nurse ?
The reason that the medical profession wants tort reform is that like any profession, they make mistakes...but they want to be somehow immune to the consequences unlike the rest of us.
When they get it, like happened in Oz, it doesn't save you or your insurance company a single red cent...and their obligations for (say) leaving a tray of cutlery in a patient during surgery are simply to get the tray out.