Seattle parents are awarded $10million settlement in 'wrongful life' case after nurse gave the mother a flu shot instead of birth-control injection and daughter was born with severe disabilities

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A federal judge in Seattle has awarded $10million to a family of a severely disabled child who was born after a community clinic nurse inadvertently gave the mother a flu shot instead of a birth-control injection.

The Seattle Times reported that U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik last week awarded the child $7.5 million for her medical, educational, and other expenses, on top of $2.5 million in damages for her parents.

After a trial earlier this year, Lasnik found that the mother, Yesenia Pacheco, did not want to become pregnant and would not have become pregnant in 2011 if the nurse at the Neighborcare Health clinic had given her the correct shot.

The family's attorneys described the case as one of 'wrongful life' and a 'wrongful pregnancy'.  

Sandra, pictured left with her mother in a picture from 2015 when she was three years old, was born in 2012 with a brain malfunction and will require care throughout her life

 Yesenia Pacheco, pictured right, and Luis Lemus, left, were awarded $10million by U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik last week due to their 'wrongful pregnancy' with their daughter

The federal government is responsible for the damages because the clinic, which serves low-income and uninsured patients, is federally funded.

Mike Maxwell and Steve Alvarez, lawyers for Pacheco and the girl's father Luis Lemus, said the case was a hard-fought battle and sharply criticized the government for refusing to accept responsibility at the outset.

The case was first filed in 2015 when the couple's daughter Sandra, identified in the court documents only as SLP, was three years old. 

'Luis and Yesenia Pacheco are pleased that they're closer to receiving the funds needed for their daughter's extraordinary medical care and training,' they wrote in a statement. 

'It was a long hard road for the family.'

Emily Langlie, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney´s Office in Seattle, which defended the lawsuit, said some of the delays were necessary to ensure medical experts could accurately measure the extent of the child's disabilities.

Pacheco, an El Salvadoran refugee who moved to the U.S. when she was 16, had gone to the clinic for a quarterly injection of Depo-Provera, a hormone used for birth control.

Pacheco already had two children with Lemus, according to the Times, and was trying to avoid a further pregnancy so she could help support her family. 

Neighborcare Health clinic, where Pacheco received the flu shot instead of birth control

Yesenia Pacheco, pictured left, and Luis Lemus, pictured right, already had two young daughters and had been looking to avoid another pregnancy when the nurse made the mistake and they became pregnant with Sandra. She is pictured here with her parents in 2015

Pacheco, an El Salvadoran refugee who moved to the U.S. when she was 16, had gone to the clinic for a quarterly injection of Depo-Provera, a hormone used for birth control

A nurse at the clinic who had been administering walk-in flu shots all day apparently did not check Pacheco's chart and gave Pacheco the flu vaccine instead, the court found.

Pacheco didn't discover the mistake until she called to make her next appointment, more than two months later and her chart showed that last time she had been billed for and administered with the influenza injection. 

She took an immediate test at the clinic which showed she was already pregnant.

When filing the lawsuit five years ago, she told KIRO TV that abortion was never an option because of her personal beliefs. 

'It's hard. I already have two girls. I didn't want anymore,' Pacheco said in Spanish, adding that she had a difficult pregnancy with her third child. 

She claimed that the clinic told her 'you are 2 1/2 months pregnant. You don't have to have it. You won't have to pay anything'. 

Yesenia Pacheco, pictured here with her then three-year-old daughter Sandra, as they filed the 'wrongful life' suit against the clinic and the federal government in 2015

The judge awarded $1.5 million to Pacheco (left) and $1 million to Lemus (right), to 'compensate for mental anguish and emotional stress' as a result of the unwanted pregnancy

Pacheco said she had always effectively communicated in Spanish with the staff before this and a doctor told her she didn't know how the 'miscommunication' happened.

'The manager said, "What do you want me to do? Fire them?"' she added.  

'Ms. Pacheco had not planned or intended to become pregnant in the fall of 2011 and had taken affirmative steps to avoid an unwanted pregnancy,' wrote Lasnik in a March order finding the government liable for her pregnancy. 

'Had she received a Depo-Provera injection on September 30, 2011, she would not have conceived. The unintended pregnancy and birth of S.L.P. were foreseeable consequences of [the nurse’s] error.

Mother-of-three Yesenia Pacheco said she loves her daughter but had not wanted another pregnancy in 2011

'The risk that a child will be born with a medical condition or disability is within the general field of danger that arises when a medical provider fails to use reasonable care in a procedure designed to prevent pregnancy.'

Sandra, who was born in 2012 with a brain malformation, is now 8 years old and in third grade at an Everett-area school, north of Seattle.

According to court documents, she suffers from a birth defect known as bilateral perisylvian polymicrogyria (PMG), which has resulted in cognitive delays, slowed speech and language skills, epilepsy, vision problems and other complications.

She has an IQ of 70, according to the family's attorneys. 

Maxwell said that she will live a normal life span, and will require some level of care and assistance for her entire life. Her parents had to administer her medication twice a day to hep her avoid seizures. 

Justice Department lawyers are asking that some of the award be placed in a 'reversionary trust' that would would return to the government if the girl does not need it.

In the decision last week, the judge awarded $1.5 million to Pacheco and $1 million to Lemus, to 'compensate for mental anguish and emotional stress' as a result of the unwanted pregnancy.

They also received an additional $42,294 to compensate for two Medicaid liens, according to court documents.