Jury awards couple $50 million in ‘wrongful birth’ lawsuit

Back in 95 I had to have anmiocentesis because of something seen on a sonogram. There was a chance based o what they saw that the child had downs syndrome. The decision was that if it turned out that the child had down ,syndrome we would abort. We had no insurance, and very low incomes so taking care of a sick child was out of the question.
It turned out that the child was perfectly normal. He is 18 now. You can't judge people for making decisions like this . We got lucky but I could just as easily be mourning a lost child right now.

You guys have a problem with the couple suing the lab? If it had been a doctor's error would you feel differently ? I think you guys are just having fun being righteous because they said they would not have had a defective child. But really where's the outrage against yet another medical company who made a Hugh error.
Yesterday you' all were all enraged about a nurse being fired for refusing to take a vaccine. Today the medical community are God's and this couple who were choosing to not have a defective child now they are the bad guys. I think you guys just get off on being outraged. Pick a scapegoat of the day and pounce.

reply to post by freakjive


All that heartache could have been avoided had the correct tests been done. But now...

reply to post by boncho


Choosing a well child over a sick child is hardly asking for a designer baby. You purposely chose inflammatory words to make it sound bad. I am so sure you would parade a defective child around like it's some kind of prize all the while using words like our special angel or some other term to sooth your hurt over a less than perfect child. That's if you don't lie to yourselves but ...

reply to post by tomoe723


I'm really quite disturbed by the whole genetic screen to determine the future of life itself, once the process is well underway.

I have mixed feelings for just one area ..and that is profound birth defect. There are babies born all the time, and all over the world who live a short time ..and mercy would have been to save them that much suffering when medical tech allows for it. That's a class of small and extreme conditions, IMO tho. The boutique approach to child birth? I guess I'm just getting too weary to fight the trend anymore ...

I've accepted in this area? We are going to become a society that looks more like Gattaca than it does anything we've known as free Americans in the past. Heck, the only BIG difference NOW between America and Gattaca (See movie for context) is portability. I think hard about the tech shown in that nightmare version of 1984 life ...and really, that IS all that's missing. Portability and speed.

When DNA scanners can be handheld and results can process and pop within reasonable time to stand and wait for the result? We'll be able to watch that movie and relate to almost everything else.

Scary, huh?

What people don't realize is that a lot of this money is going to go to medical care. A child like that will need specialized baby sitting services, nurses, equipment, etc. Not to mention the medical costs.

$50 million sounds just about right.

Since most insurance companies have a lifetime cap of a million, and sick children have maxed that out by the age of 5, I can see the reason for their lawsuit.


So before everyone starts screaming about how horrible the parents are, they wanted a child prescreened for a very expensive genetic condition that they obviously knew they carried, and the company screwed up.

If you had a child tomorrow that would require a very expensive lifetime medical care, how would you pay for it?

Wrabbit2000
reply to post by tomoe723

 

I'm really quite disturbed by the whole genetic screen to determine the future of life itself, once the process is well underway.

I have mixed feelings for just one area ..and that is profound birth defect. There are babies born all the time, and all over the world who live a short time ..and mercy would have been to save them that much suffering when medical tech allows for it. That's a class of small and extreme conditions, IMO tho. The boutique approach to child birth? I guess I'm just getting too weary to fight the trend anymore ...

I've accepted in this area? We are going to become a society that looks more like Gattaca than it does anything we've known as free Americans in the past. Heck, the only BIG difference NOW between America and Gattaca (See movie for context) is portability. I think hard about the tech shown in that nightmare version of 1984 life ...and really, that IS all that's missing. Portability and speed.

When DNA scanners can be handheld and results can process and pop within reasonable time to stand and wait for the result? We'll be able to watch that movie and relate to almost everything else.

Scary, huh?

its not a trend, it is the product of a for profit medical system. Hate the player, not the game.


If you had a child tomorrow that would require expensive medical care and nurses for the rest of its life, how would you pay for it?


And don't say you would figure something out.

reply to post by nixie_nox

And don't say you would figure something out.

If not that, then what?

Does anyone plan to have a special needs child? No.

Nix....I DO have a special needs son. It IS a part of my reality and figuring something out IS my day to day way of life with what I face as a Father. My challenges are nowhere near as great as some, and those of the story here, to be clear.

However....Given some technology advancement, it's entirely possible that some, if not most of the lesser conditions forming into a "Syndrome" we deal with could and would have been spotted. If such testing had been available over a decade ago, do I regret my wife wouldn't have taken them? (We've talked this out at some length). No ... I wouldn't WANT to know, aside from again, the rare class of extreme defects and UltraSound ought to catch things to hit that level.

So..you speak in theory. I actually live it. It's not theory to me ...and figuring something out is really all anyone CAN do in this crazy thing we call life, unless we're blessed by the last name Koch, Bloomberg, Soros or Buffet.

Asktheanimals
I'm gonna sue the parents for permanent psychological scarring.

They singlehandedly ruined my faith in humanity.

This makes you wonder at what % of defects their child would have been "acceptable".

edit on 23-12-2013 by Asktheanimals because: (no reason given)

probably any defects that would allow their child to live a fulfilling life and not be little more than a walking vegetable
no legs? you can live a pretty good life
misshapen face? you can still be more than happy
cant digest milk properly? who cares its not that great for you in the first place
incapable of any kind of real thoughts or communication? probably going to have a very low quality of life thats going to burden yourself and those around you to such a degree that you would not want to be alive if you were even capable of making such decisions
this was about preventing unnecessary suffering and i defy you to argue that allowing unnecessary suffering is the right thing to do

At what point is a birth of human life to be decided as wrongful, or right? As the poster above pointed out, what about genetic predispositions toward allergies or other mild conditions? If a human life is not to be perfect, is it perfectly ok to abort it? And if the parents feel so strongly about it, what stops their decision now, after the fact (Despite the law)? But I digress, this is not so much a topic about abortion in general.

Moving on, and something that I didn't notice anyone point out previously, is that despite the fact that this couple apparently had the foresight that their child might have had a higher risk of genetic deficiency (prompting their testing), they still procreated first. Perhaps they should have considered adoption, or in-vitro from a more suitable genetic donar, as an alternative before creating a life with such risk inherent. According to the article their child was given a 50/50 prognosis. That sounds like piss poor odds, it seems to me they made the call, knowing full well the risk. 50 million dollars, for a lost coin toss.

---nevermind

I agree with Freeborn and schuyler concerning this case. That huge fee was related to this protocol and detection, which they failed to perform on all levels. They failed to even look for the thing they were hired to do.

In any case, this is a huge sum. I would like to see that 50 million spread around to 4 different families in this situation, but its a court case, and against a lucrative corporation, so that was the ruling. And their child will get the help he needs and quality of life he'd be lacking otherwise.

But then I'd have the whole world living in an advanced abundant system, with lots of breaks for single parents of large families and "challenged" children or adults. A completely different world one that would foster creativity, growth and happiness of all. We certainly have the funds and technology. But of course, wouldn't have international bankers and Queen, Rothchild's and Vatican with 90% of the wealth. Nope, they'd fork up or be chained to the wall like spook in the wizard of oz. Had enough of this unjust and corrupt world that by condoning it, you're committing massive child abuse and crimes against humanity.

If the funds were an issue, do away with money altogether.

The award seems VERY high. It seems the reward should cover any and all medical and social care required by the child, as well as a sum for emotional suffering. The lab didn't CAUSE the defects, it failed to detect them, they don't share 100% of the blame, they shouldn't share 100% of the responsibility of bringing comfort to the family. Medical care and the like is extremely expensive for people with severe defects, but not 50 million expensive. There are tons of people living lives with these problems and few, if any, of them are doing it with 50 million dollars.

One thing that needs to be considered when trying to take the moral high-ground, and bashing people for using science to do things like this:

Some say it's wrong to try to ensure that the child you bear is healthy and free of issues that will cause severe suffering in the child/person. They say it's not natural. Birth is always a roll of the dice, and we shouldn't be trying to "meddle" with such matters.

From the people I've seen with that opinion, they are highly hypocritical, and I'll explain why.

The type of defects that would cause a person to abort a child are usually the ones which would, in their preferred "natural" world would NOT survive. It would die shortly after child birth. If we are going to extend life and give complex medical assistance to children born with defects, that is NOT natural anymore than screening the babies beforehand is.

The human race is physically weak today because we allow our weak to survive and pass on their weakness. Sounds harsh, I know. Physical weakness is not the same as mental weakness, and as humans have favored intelligence over strength, being physically weaker isn't such the issue it would be for most other species.

There was a time where you couldn't prevent afflicted children from being born (as you wouldn't know they were until after birth) so we dealt with that by taking care of our brothers and sisters with physical issues.

We are no longer in that time. We can easily prevent babies being born which will go on to live a life of severe suffering, anguish, and untimely death due to genetic defects and the like.

I care for life, I care for our species, which is why I see no problem stopping suffering before it begins. I feel you are still killing a living being, one way or another, but I don't feel you are violating anyone's will. A featus doesn't have motives, desires, etc for you to violate. You are not creating any suffering, in fact you are removing it. That is what someone who cares for their fellow humans would do, try to avoid suffering among the population as much as possible.

That isn't a condemnation about people who are against aborting defective babies, simply my opinion.

It's sad, nobody can deny that, but because something is sad doesn't make it wrong. Dying is sad, it's something every single one of us will do, that doesn't mean it's wrong.

Bottom line for me- LONG ago we as a species abandoned any notion of "nature" deciding who lives and who dies. It seems incredibly hypocritical to be so selective about when you feel nature has the right to control life and death anymore than humanity does.

It's already been said, mostly. They paid for a service, and the company screwed up. They should dish it out.

I'm going to try and keep this as nice as possible while not betraying my true thoughts on the matter... I think the most moral thing to do is a painless euthanasia for a child so unfit. We're having issues taking care of those who can actually contribute... it just doesn't make much sense to let feelings get in the way of what's truly best.

No need to flame me, I don't mean harm, just stating an opinion.

webedoomed
It's already been said, mostly. They paid for a service, and the company screwed up. They should dish it out.

I'm going to try and keep this as nice as possible while not betraying my true thoughts on the matter... I think the most moral thing to do is a painless euthanasia for a child so unfit. We're having issues taking care of those who can actually contribute... it just doesn't make much sense to let feelings get in the way of what's truly best.

No need to flame me, I don't mean harm, just stating an opinion.

It's basically triage on a large scale, with limited resources, there are only so many spots to fill. That's just reality, until that issue changes, determining who is fit to live will unfortunately be required of our society. We just have to make sure we are all basically on the same page when it comes to the factors behind the decision.

It's like if you have four people in a room, and only enough air for two. Is it wrong to kill two, so that two more will survive? If the two are not killed, all four will die anyway. Lots of grey involved, yet many people seem to think it's just black and white.

Anyone here actually born with a genetic defect and know the unintended consequences of such an affliction?

I'm willing to bet the majority of you don't and are basing your opinions off the first emotional impulse you receive from your brain.

reply to post by freakjive


This does make me sick. While I agree slapping the hospital with a penalty for not doing what they're supposed to do, I'd never award these parents with 50 million. I swear, I just hope the kid doesn't grow up and see what their parents said about him.

Shameful and makes me want to distance myself from humanity even more.

They wanted a "perfect" child and alas, nature reared its head and provided perhaps exactly what this couple needed.

50 million isn't required to raise even a child with disabilities. They are being greedy. Welcome to the new age.

reply to post by freakjive


These people are the lowest form of life. The progressive mindset hard at work. Thankfully life will suck for these scum bags and not because they have to take care of a special needs kids that will be the only thing that might save their pathetic souls.





Being progressive is a sickness of the mind and soul.

Elton
Jury awards $50 million verdict against LabCorp, Wash. hospital

link

A Washington state jury returned a $50 million verdict this week against LabCorp and a hospital after finding both were negligent in testing for a genetic defect in a fetus.

On Tuesday, the jury found that the failure to detect a rare genetic disorder — after the child’s parents specifically requested the test to determine whether to continue the pregnancy — injured the child, Oliver Wuth, and his parents, Brock and Rhea Wuth.

The verdict is to pay for damages and for Oliver’s Wuth’s lifetime care. Both LabCorp and Valley Medical Center, in King County, Wash., must share equally the payment of the $50 million verdict, the jury decided.

This whole event is quite sad but I do think labs and hospitals need to perform their testing correctly and accurately (so the lawsuit seems justified based on my 30 seconds of research).

The lawyer probably used terms that sound barbaric but his job is to win the lawsuit for his clients and not to frame things sensitively.

At least the kid is alive and going to have access to the medical attention his condition may require...

Everyone on the planet has access to fresh drinking water, non GMO healthy foods, and an all out uncorrupted way of life, but that doesn't mean they are going to get it in any way shape or form.

I am not picking on you as I am pro-choice. I believe people should be allowed to make their own decisions on the matter of their own pregnancy. That being said, personally I am totally against abortion, but If a someone wants to terminate the life of a baby human they are 100 % responsible for creating (rape, forced-pregnancies aside) or the person performing the procedure, that will be on their consciousness for the rest of their lives and not mine. Lord have mercy if there actually is a Heaven and a Hell - (well actually no Lord, don't have mercy)

Sorry went of on a tangent their, but my original thought was just because his parents were awarded $50 million dollars doesn't mean he will receive the love and care needed to determine what the best medical attention is that he could be receiving given that his parents have no shame in publicly declaring they would have killed their son if they knew THEY would have labelled him as defective.