Woman who got pregnant after she was given flu shot instead of birth control sues clinic
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Yesenia Pacheco loves her 3-year-old daughter Sandra, but she wasn’t planning on having a child. In fact, she was actively trying not to have a child.
That is why Pacheco has filed a civil lawsuit in a U.S. District Court against the U.S. government, claiming that a federally-funded health clinic in Seattle accidentally gave her a flu shot instead of a birth control injection.
Pacheco claims that in September 2011 she scheduled an appointment to receive a Depo-Provera shot, a birth control method 99 percent effective in preventing pregnancy, at NeighborCare Health. Then, when she returned for the follow-up injection three months later, staff at the community center informed her of the screw-up. A pregnancy test taken at the clinic revealed that Pacheco was pregnant.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"I asked what happened,” the Spanish-speaking Pacheco told Seattle’s KIRO news station. “They said you are 2 1/2 months pregnant. You don't have to have it. You won't have to pay anything."
Pacheco decided not to have an abortion because of personal beliefs and, after a tough pregnancy, Sandra was born in 2012 with a brain malformation affecting motor and speech called unilateral perisylvian polymicrogyria – a medical issue that forces Sandra to take pills twice a day to avoid seizures.
Her attorneys, Steve Alvarez and Mike Maxwell, argue that the clinic's mess-up should legally be considered the reason that Sandra was born into a "wrongful life”…“as a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s negligent acts and/or omissions to perform the medical care with due care.”
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"She loves the child, but she was put in a position she did not want to be in," Maxwell said.
Pacheco is suing for an unspecified amount to recoup medical bills and pain and suffering.
"It's hard. I already have two girls. I didn't want anymore," she said.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}NeighborCare Health’s Mark Secord told local media that they "are aware of the situation" involving Pacheco and "feel great empathy for her."
Pacheco is still waiting for a determination on the lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Justice.