Friday 18 December 2009

Deprived of the right to kill their baby

How awful is this:

A COUPLE are suing their doctor for failing to tell the mother she was at a high risk of having a child with Down syndrome.

When Bethany McDonnell was born at Wyong Hospital on July 26, 2007, her parents, Jean and Terrence McDonnell, were shocked to discover she had the congenital abnormality.

In what has been described as a highly unusual case, the McDonnells are suing their general practitioner, Sachin Choudhary, and the Northern Sydney Central Coast Area Health Service, claiming that they were ''deprived of the opportunity to discontinue the pregnancy'' and would continue to ''suffer psychological injury and economic loss'' due to doctor's negligence.


But at least we can sue these parents for choosing to remain alive themselves. In so doing they are depriving us of a significantly higher quality of life, unimpeded by their decision to keep consuming oxygen that would otherwise be available to the rest of us.

(From here).

4 comments:

Ruth said...

That is so awful.

Anonymous said...

Gordon,

Ghastly!

Anonymous said...

Thank you for you comment on this - can you believe this couple - and what of the daughter - she will growing up knowing what kind of incredibly limited people they are. People like this should not be able to procreate.

Alexb said...

the doctor was negligent, the couple have every right to sue. If the same thing happened to me I would sue too. I hope they win, so they can set a precedent.