Since 1997, yes. That is the year the Florida Supreme Court ruled that although parents can not sue for the child’s death under the Wrongful Death Statute because a fetus does not qualify as a “person” under Florida’s Wrongful Death Act, parents of a stillborn child can sue for emotional damages from the baby’s death as well as the medical expenses from the pregnancy. In that case, doctors examined the mother and instructed her to go to the hospital for testing. She did, but the next morning her baby was delivered at the hospital stillborn. The parents claimed the hospital doctors and staff were negligent because they should have delivered the child in an emergency c-section the day before when the test results were obtained.
