Dr. Marc Siegel, a medical contributor for Fox News, claims that the high number of maternal deaths in the United States can be attributed to socioeconomic health care disparities, COVID, and obesity rates. In a rather unsurprising turn of events, an Australian man named Anil Koppula recently had his lawsuit against a hospital dismissed. Koppula had the audacity to sue the Royal Women’s Hospital for a whopping 1 billion Australian dollars (approximately $643 million USD) after apparently suffering from a “psychotic illness” caused by watching his wife’s cesarean section. The incident occurred back in 2018, but Koppula conveniently decided to come forward years later with his baseless claims. According to Koppula, the hospital and its staff breached their duty of care by “encouraging” and “permitting” him to witness the delivery. How dare they! C-sections are fairly common procedures, with approximately 32% of births in the US this year being cesarean deliveries, as reported by the CDC. But of course, that’s not relevant to Koppula’s delusional lawsuit. He insists that seeing his wife’s blood and organs during the procedure led to his “psychotic illness” and ultimately caused the breakdown of his marriage. The Royal Women’s Hospital, however, adamantly denied any wrongdoing. Koppula represented himself in court and unsurprisingly failed to make a convincing case. Justice James Gorton dismissed the lawsuit, rightfully labeling it as an “abuse of process.” A medical examination conducted as part of the legal proceedings found that Koppula’s alleged psychiatric impairment did not meet the necessary threshold. Despite his disagreement with the findings, Koppula did not bother to challenge them. In the end, the judge concluded that Koppula was legally ineligible to receive damages for non-economic loss. It’s almost comical how some individuals will go to great lengths to exploit the legal system for their own gain.
