KEY POINTS:
The High Court has upheld a District Court decision that an unwanted pregnancy following a failed sterilisation operation can be classed as a personal injury under accident compensation rules.
However, Justice Jillian Mallon has moved to stem a possible tide of unwanted-pregnancy claims by setting out in her decision that pregnancy arising from consensual intercourse is not an accident under the 2001 ACC legislation.
The mother at the centre of this case had decided to limit her family to four children and had had a tubal ligation in 2003.
Justice Mallon cited British and Australian case law in her judgment, which found that the woman becoming pregnant with her fifth child could be described as an "injury" because it could either be described as the mother being harmed, or having her bodily integrity invaded.
Lawyer magazine reported that Justice Mallon surveyed various features and stages of pregnancy, including nausea and vomiting, stretch marks, increased heart rate, tiredness and cramps, and said that "if these kinds of changes and resulting effects were suffered by some other impact upon the body ... there would be little difficulty in calling them harm".
While pregnancy was a natural process, the physical impact of pregnancy was capable of being described as an injury, Justice Mallon found.
ACC Minister Ruth Dyson has previously said ACC would investigate the implications of the court's decision to the scheme. ACC has been granted leave to appeal against the ruling to the Court of Appeal.
An ACC spokesman said it was likely the case would be taken that far to ensure some certainty about the situation for similar cases in the future.
