An Australian man has tried to sue a hospital after he claimed that watching his wife give birth to their two children by caesarean section made him suffer from a mental disorder.
Anil Coppola took legal action against the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne, demanding $1 billion in damages after witnessing his wife’s caesarean section in 2018.
He said that he suffered a “psychotic illness” after seeing his wife’s blood and organs, and that watching the procedure led to “the collapse of his marriage.”
Coppola claims that he was encouraged, or allowed, to observe the birth, and that while doing so, he saw his wife’s internal organs and blood.
The man believes that the hospital should be responsible for compensation worth one billion dollars.
The Herald Sun newspaper reported that Judge James Gorton dismissed the man’s lawsuit on Tuesday, describing it as an “abuse of the court.”
According to the ruling, the law does not allow a person to recover compensation for non-economic loss unless his injury is a “serious injury.”
Coppola underwent a medical examination, and the committee determined that “the degree of psychological impairment did not rise to the level of harm he was talking about.”