Judgment, 7 July 1987

The plaintiff was a pregnant woman just under the age of 36 who consulted her physician on having an amniocentesis performed because of her age. Her physician advised her against this, emphasizing the danger to the fetus and the fact that she had just had a healthy child and that her present pregnancy was progressing well. When the plaintiff subsequently gave birth to a child suffering from Down's syndrome, she sued the physician for maintenance of the child claiming that she would have had an abortion had she known that the child was defective. The Federal Court of the Federal Republic of Germany reversed the decision of the lower court and dismissed her claim. It held that she had not proved that she had been inadequately counselled by the defendant since he had counselled her about the dangers of Down's syndrome during her previous pregnancy sufficiently for her to have obtained a second opinion about having the amniocentesis performed and since it was standard practice not to perform an amniocentesis on women who were under the age of 36.