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Wednesday 11 February 2015

Families Whose Babies Were Switched At Birth In Hospital Blunder 20-Years Ago Awarded £1.5million

Mothers whose babies were switched at birth in hospital blunder awarded £1.5million
Mrs Serrano discovered she was not Manon’s mother 10 years ago (Picture: AP

Two families who discovered they had been given each other’s babies ten years after the girls were born have been awarded €2million (£1.48million) in compensation by the hospital that made the blunder.
Sophie Serrano, 38, discovered she was not the mother of her daughter Manon 10 years ago after her husband – who expressed concerns that she bore no resemblance to him – failed a paternity test, prompting her take a maternity test of her own.

Sophie Serrano was given a baby that was not hers after a mix-up (Picture: TFI)
Sophie Serrano was given a baby that was not hers after a mix-up (Picture: TFI)
She then tracked down another woman who had given birth around the same time at the Cannes hospital in 1994, and learned that their girls had been switched after being put into the same incubator.
And a court in the southern French town of Grasse has ordered the Cannes-la-Bocca Clinic to pay compensation to both families, £593,000 will be split between the swapped babies – who are now adult women – and £223,000 of which will go to the parents. £445,000 will be awarded to three siblings.
(Picture: AP)
The families were awarded the equivalent of £1.5million (Picture: AP)
The two families have distanced themselves from each other since meeting a decade ago as they found the experience ‘too difficult and distressing’.
‘You find yourself in front of a woman who is biologically your mother but who is a stranger,’ Manon said after a hearing in December.
Speaking on French television following the ruling, a lawyer for one of the families said they were ‘completely satisfied with the decision,’ despite receiving six times less than what they had asked for.
A court in the southern town of Grasse today ordered the clinic in Cannes to pay the compensation to the two families including to Mrs Serrano and her daughter Manon, pictured 
Sophie Serrano, pictured shortly after giving birth at the age of 18, discovered her daughter had been accidentally switched at birth ten years after the event


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