https://www.startribune.com/judge-drastically-reduces-11-million-jury-award-in-wrongful-conception-vasectomy-lawsuit/601384557A civil court case in Minnesota has set precedent for the state in a trial by a man who sued a urulogy clinic. After a vascectomy, a nurse misread a result, saying the operation was a success when he was still shooting live rounds. Four years later when his wife became pregnant, the results were revisited and he sued for malpractice
The jury in the trial analyzed all the forms of damages and counterclaims from the two sides. Weighing emotional damages, the costs of carrying a pregnancy to term, the 'loss of companionship' euphemism. And from that, the jury was given specific instructions to subtract the value the child would bring to the family over the course of its life, the value of a son or daughter. They determined that to be $0.00, one of the few human beings to be judged literally worthless in a court of law.
This $0 value for an unwanted human life was upheld on appeal despite the strenuous ethical objection of a horrified counsel for the urology clinic who described it as perverse and unjustified.
So it begs the question. If a jury is going to place a dollar amount on the recreational sex of a married couple, place a value to the burden of pregnancy, write a number for the emotional toll of fatherhood- what should the value of a son or daughter be? Are the couple left with a toxic asset, a worthless mouth to feed, a ball and chain?
The value the kid brings isn't monetary.
In a perfect world, the child would be worth any price.
In this courtroom though, it might be the stupidest way to calculate a damage value.