United States v. Kubrick

In 1968, Kubrick (plaintiff) underwent VA hospital surgery involving the antibiotic neomycin and soon developed hearing loss and ear ringing. In January 1969, a specialist diagnosed nerve deafness and told him it might be linked to the neomycin. After multiple denied requests for VA pension adjustments, Kubrick learned in 1971 from his original doctor that neomycin should never have been administered to him in the first place, prompting a malpractice suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), which has a two-year statute of limitations. The government argued the claim accrued in 1969 when Kubrick learned of the injury and its cause; Kubrick argued it accrued only in 1971, when he understood its legal implications.