A mother has successfully sued for compensation after a prenatal test failed to diagnose a serious genetic disability in a baby that she would have otherwise aborted.

The mother is a carrier of a rare genetic condition and, when she became pregnant, worried her child might have the same condition. She had planned to exercise her constitutional right to travel to the UK for an abortion if a test showed her unborn child had the same condition, the High Court heard. The test gave a “normal” result and the woman proceeded with the pregnancy. However, the child was born with the condition and needs 24 hour care.

Because of the incorrect test, the mother claimed she was deprived of the ability to give informed consent and to make an informed choice in respect of the continuance of her pregnancy. The mother sued The Rotunda Hospital, Dublin, and Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital, Dublin. Full liability in the case was conceded by the hospitals who said that “in the particular circumstances of this case and in light of the outcome of the recent referendum repealing the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution” liability was conceded, and a public policy defence was withdrawn.

Mr Justice Cross, noting liability had been conceded, said he accepted that but he would have thought the result of the referendum had nothing to do with it.