The Right Not to be Born

Former Member

France debates right not to be born.
A Paris court ruled that disabled children can sue doctors over not having aborted them.
France's highest appeals court ruled that children with Down syndrome have a legal right never to have been born and could sue doctors that attended the pregnancy.

This debate happened quite a while ago (December 2001), but nevertheless, what are your thoughts? Should children with Down Syndrome be able to sue doctors because they didn't abort them?

Former Member

Oh my god, that's mental!
Surely if that was passed, then people with diabetes, blind people or other genetic diseases could also sue?

Former Member

Yes those were my thoughts PussyKatty. Although it is more the case when doctors know during pregnancy whether the child has some form of problem/defficiency, as they do with Down Syndrome.
For example, in one case, a doctor failed to warn an expectant mother when pre-natal scans showed that her baby had the symptoms of Down Syndrome. The mother then argued that she would have aborted if she had been given a correct pre-natal diagnosis.

Former Member

Should children with Down Syndrome be able to sue doctors because they didn't abort them?

It just doesn't make sense to me! I mean, couldn't the children then also sue their mothers for not choosing to abort them, or even sue their parents for the extra 21 chromosome?

Former Member

it does seem a little over the top and if the doctors had aborted them then there would be problems with pro-life campaigners.

maybe they would have been better to make some kind of law about eythenasia (sp) so then the people with downs syndrom could decide for thenselves.

Former Member

Originally posted by Rosey Posey
maybe they would have been better to make some kind of law about eythenasia (sp) so then the people with downs syndrom could decide for thenselves.

Yeh, but i'm sure they'd rather have been aborted than euthenised (does that word exist?).

Former Member

This story seems pretty bizarre, and I definitely don't remember it being reported.

Anyone got a link to a story on a news site about it?

Former Member

yeah your right it is different having to die once you've been born if that makes sence.

Former Member

Here's what the BBC reported on it:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1753000/1753065.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/europe/newsid_1752000/1752556.stm

It's been, quite rightly, rejected.

Former Member

And surely its not the doctors decision anyway? Is it not up to the parents?

Former Member

Originally posted by Lorna
And surely its not the doctors decision anyway? Is it not up to the parents?

Well, it wasn't as simple as that: the doctor failed to diagnose the abnormality in utero, so the idea behind the law suit was that the doctor failed in his/her duty to diagnose such conditions pre-natally.

I can sympathise with that, but a law suit isn't going to help future kids, and I can also see the point of the disabled groups who are said to have found the implication that disabled foetuses should be aborted highly offensive.