Court Opinion

ID: 9567936
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:59:08.65803+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:23:16.424581
License: Public Domain

*722Hunt, Justice,
dissenting.
I write separately because I disagree with the majority that there is no cause of action for a wrongful birth, and I also disagree with Justice Benham, that such a cause of action should incorporate the extraordinary expenses of rearing a severely impaired child.
I agree with Justice Benham that there is nothing particularly innovative or unusual about wrongful birth other than its nomenclature. That is, this cause of action, just as the cause of action for wrongful pregnancy recognized in Fulton-DeKalb Hosp. Auth. v. Graves, 252 Ga. 441 (314 SE2d 653) (1984), can be analyzed in terms of traditional tort law. The elements of a negligence claim are present. The majority acknowledges the existence of a duty to inform, and a breach of that duty in this case, but confuses the remaining two elements of causation and damages. To determine causation, the injury must be identified. Contrary to the analyses of the majority and dissent, the injury caused by the defendants’ negligence in this case is, as in Graves, the birth of the unwanted child. The injury is not, as Justice Benham argues, the imposition of the extraordinary expenses of rearing a severely impaired child. Rather, as in Graves, “but for” the defendants’ negligence there would have been no child at all, not a normal child. And the damages which would ensue from such an injury would logically include the ordinary, as well as extraordinary, expenses of the child’s existence. See Judge Beasley’s opinion, concurring in part and dissenting in part, in this case below, Atlanta Obstetrics &c. Group v. Abelson, 195 Ga. App. 274, 282 (392 SE2d 916) (1990).
In any event, the plaintiffs should be entitled to recover the damages available to the plaintiffs in Graves, including expenses for pain and suffering, medical complications, costs of delivery, lost wages, and loss of consortium. Graves, supra at 443 (2). As we noted in Graves, “[t]hese damages are consistent with the damages which may be recovered in any malpractice case and represent no real deviation from traditional tort remedies.” Id. at 443 (2). Because of Graves, however, neither ordinary child-rearing expenses, nor extraordinary expenses may be recovered. As stated by Judge Beasley:
The determination that the law should not reach into a realm which requires the measurement of human life value forecloses a facing of the same dilemma when addressing the costs of raising a congenitally imperfect human being. It requires saying that this child, unwanted during the period before birth if defective but now in life and not a fetus, is worth less than a child unwanted altogether during the same correlative period of gestation. Otherwise, what is the distinction between awarding ordinary costs and extraordinary *723costs? What is the basis or ground or reason for the latter when there is no basis or ground or reason acceptable in Georgia law for the former?
195 Ga. App. at 282. Accordingly, I would find a cause of action for wrongful birth, but would limit damages to those recognized in Graves as recoverable for wrongful pregnancy.11

 Recognition of damages beyond those permitted by Graves is a matter of legislative policy, as suggested by the majority, to be considered and resolved by the General Assembly.