'Everything wrong with medical negligence cases is neither new or unique'

The current system is pleasing nobody - judges or victims, writes Francesca Comyn

Duty of candour? Pic: Getty

The €17.8 million to be paid out to a boy who suffered brain damage at birth is a record compensation award which highlights all that is wrong with the current system of handling medical negligence cases.

The High Court heard there was a two-hour delay delivering Tadhg Costello at Kerry General hospital on 25 May 2006 and a failure to recognise the risk of foetal hypoxia.

Following his birth by emergency caesarean section, he ...