The important thing is that the government tries to "do something" right... even if doing something does more harm than good... right?

A joint study by the Brookings Institution and American Enterprise Institute found that government regulations that are supposed to save lives actually end up killing more people.

Why? Because safety laws almost always have unintended bad consequences.
...
In 1972, the FDA passed a law requiring child safety caps on many medications. It was supposed to keep kids from being poisoned by drugs like aspirin. But there is an unexpected side effect. Because safety caps are hard to get off, some people -- particularly older people -- leave them off, and some parents, feeling safer with the cap, leave the aspirin where kids can reach it.

A study of this "lulling effect" concluded that an additional 3,000 children have been poisoned by aspirin because of the regulation.

I've talked about Do Something Syndrome before... and this is yet another perfect example.  Sometimes the hardest thing you can when something bad happens is to fight the urge to yell out "There oughta be a law."  Most of the time, there shouldn't be one.

Via Cato@Liberty.