Court Opinion

ID: 9752040
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 17:30:25.581447+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:51:05.375162
License: Public Domain

FLAHERTY, Justice,
concurring.
The issue presented in this appeal is whether actions for money damages pursuant to the wrongful death and survival statutes will lie on behalf of an aborted, non-viable eight-week old fetus. The plurality contends that in order to maintain a wrongful death and/or survival action, an aborted fetus must be capable of independent existence at the time of death. The fetus in this case was not viable, and the plurality, therefore, affirmed the dismissal of the complaint.
I concur with the dismissal of the complaint. My rationale, however is different from the plurality’s. As I have written in my dissenting opinion in Hudak v. Georgy; 535 Pa. 152, 634 A.2d 600 (1993) also decided today, the fetus is not an “individual” for purposes of money recovery under the survival and wrongful death acts. The injury here, as in Hudak, is to the parent, and the parent’s cause of action remains undisturbed.