The common law does not recognise one person as having any legally compensable interest in the physical well-being of another. The law affords compensation to the victim but not to others who suffer harm in consequence of the victim’s injuries or death [2]
There is a statutory exception… now contained in the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 [3]
There is a further limited category of cases… in which damages may be recovered for personal injury consequent on the death or injury of another person… the claimant has witnessed the wrongful death or injury (or threat of such death or injury) to someone they love. The scope of this category of cases is the subject of these appeals… [4]
The critical question… is whether a doctor, in providing medical services to a patient, not only owes a duty to the patient to take care to protect the patient from harm but also owes a duty to close members of the patient’s family to take care to protect them against the risk of injury that they might suffer from the experience of witnessing the death or injury of
their relative from an illness caused by the doctor’s negligence. [22]
a critical question… is whether… the rules developed in relation to accidents apply where, as a result of negligence of a
doctor, a person dies or manifests injury from an illness which proper treatment would have prevented. We do not think that this question can be answered satisfactorily without considering the general principles that determine when a doctor owes a duty of care to someone other than their patient. [24]
That is not the usual situation in medical negligence cases… In these cases, the event (or its aftermath) witnessed by the secondary victim is generally not an accident; it is the suffering or death of their relative from illness. As a shorthand and without intending it to be a term of art, we will refer to such an event as a “medical crisis”. The question… is whether witnessing a negligently caused medical crisis (or its aftermath) can in principle found a claim for damages by a secondary victim or whether such a claim can lie only where the triggering event is an accident in the sense we have described. [53]
Typically in accident cases, the accident and the defendant’s negligent act or omission which caused the accident occur at much the same time. [95]
we do not consider that an analogy can reasonably be drawn between the situation,.. where illness is caused by witnessing an accident (or its immediate aftermath) involving a victim with whom the claimant has a close tie of love and affection and situations where the claimant does not witness an accident but suffers illness as a result of witnessing
such a person suffering a medical crisis. [115]
It cannot be said that a doctor who treats a patient thereby enters into a doctor-patient relationship with any member of the patient’s family and thereby assumes responsibility for their health. [137]
a fundamental question about the nature of the doctor’s role… We are not able to accept that the responsibilities of a medical practitioner… extend to protecting members of the patient’s close family from exposure to the traumatic experience of witnessing the death or manifestation of disease or injury in their relative. To impose such a responsibility on hospitals and doctors would go beyond what… is reasonably regarded as the nature and scope of their role. [138]
the general policy of the law is opposed to granting remedies to third parties for the effects of injuries to other people. What therefore principally requires justification is not the narrowness of the category of cases in which a claimant who suffers personal injury which is secondary to the death or injury of another person can recover damages but the
fact that it exists at all. [140]
the persons whom doctors ought reasonably to have in contemplation when directing their minds to the care of a patient do not include members of the patient’s close family who might be psychologically affected by witnessing the effects of a disease which the doctor ought to have diagnosed and treated. Hence there does not exist the proximity in the relationship between the parties necessary to give rise to a duty of care. [142]
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