The ability of hospitals to recover medical costs for treating traffic accident victims has been restricted to £100 a day, but they are fighting back, a judge has heard.Mr Bernard McCabe, counsel for a patient being sued for £8,300, told the Circuit Civil Court that the High Court limit was £150 a day less than the figure hospitals claimed was an economic charge.Health boards have publicly estimated accumulated losses in multiples of millions since the 1993 decision of Mr Justice Kinlen, which capped daily hospital charges at £100.The boards claim the taxpayer is being asked to carry a cost which should rightly be borne by insurance companies held liable by the courts or accepting liability in personal injury actions.Mr Gary McCarthy, counsel for St James's Hospital, told Judge Liam Devally the hospitals had decided to litigate medical costs issues separately. He was seeking to delay the trial of an action by St James's to recover £8,300 from Mr Bernard Shannon, Ballyfermot Parade, Dublin, until after the outcome of a High Court appeal against reduced medical costs in another case.Mr Shannon was hospitalised for 30 days as the result of a road traffic accident and eventually settled his claim. Judge Devally, on the basis that there was existing High Court authority on the matter, refused to delay the trial and ordered that the hospital's claim be heard at an early date.Mr McCabe said the hospitals, in estimating a daily rate, divided the cost of running the hospital by the number of beds or occupancy, and Mr Justice Kinlen had found this produced alarmingly high figures. He had found that, while health boards were entitled to make a charge under the Health (Amendment) Act, 1986, they could not charge the full economic cost of running the hospital just because there was probably an insurance company which would take up the bill.There had been a lack of guidance from the Oireachtas on how a charge should be calculated, and Judge Kinlen had recommended, as a matter of urgency, it be referred back to the Oireachtas for clarification.It was learned yesterday that hospitals have issued dozens of civil bills against road traffic accident victims they have treated.