Christina Spicer  |  March 5, 2021

Category: Legal News

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Plaintiffs join class action over deadly mold in Seattle Children's Hospital

Fifteen more patients are joining a class action lawsuit accusing Seattle Children’s Hospital of hiding problems with its airflow system, leading to over a dozen mold infections — seven of which were deadly. 

The problem with the hospital’s air handling system plagued Seattle Children’s for nearly two decades, between 2000 and 2019; however, caretakers of those being treated at the hospital were allegedly not informed of the potentially deadly mold, Aspergillus, circulating in the facility. 

“We’re looking at maintenance of premise and we’re looking at management decisions. And what happened here — that even the doctors and nurses weren’t aware of,” a lawyer representing the plaintiffs told local reporters. “So this action is really targeted against the management — the building and engineering department of Seattle Children’s — about a systemic cover-up that’s existed now for almost 19 years.”

At least 14 children have been infected by Aspergillus after being treated at Seattle Children’s, seven of whom have died from complications from the mold, reports local NBC affiliate K5.

The class action lawsuit connects the children’s infections directly with the poorly maintained airflow system, saying that problems with the system included standing water, leaks, clogged drainage systems, filth, and even live and dead birds stuck in the system. Further, the hospital failed to develop or implement a maintenance plan, hire qualified maintenance staff, and allegedly misallocated funds that should have gone to testing and operating the system. 

The class acton lawsuit says that Seattle Children’s Hospital “negligently maintained air-handling system could cause the transmission of Aspergillus mold into its premises.” Further, hospital officials allegedly hid the problem from the public. 

The lawsuit was originally filed in 2019. Lawyers representing the plaintiffs reportedly announced on Thursday that an additional 15 patients have joined the class action lawsuit. 

“For us, it’s very important that no one else go through the situation that we went through,” one plaintiff, the mother of a teen who died of an Aspergillus infection after having brain surgery at Seattle Children’s Hospital told K5 reporters. 

The CEO of Seattle Children’s Hospital reportedly announced in November that it planned to install custom filters in operating rooms, stating that they believed the Aspergillus infections were isolated incidents, in response to the allegations that the hospital allowed deadly mold to circulate.

Were you or a loved one infected with mold after being treated at a hospital? Are you or a loved one a patient at Seattle Children’s Hospital? Tell us about your experience in the comment section below. 

The plaintiffs are represented by SKKM Law Office and the John Layman Law Firm.

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One thought on Seattle Children’s Hospital Hit With Class Action Lawsuit Over Deadly Mold

  1. Kimberly A Martin says:

    My son actually had surgery on his hands around that same time and although he did not get any infection or whatever from the mold they did have to postponing surgery keeping us in Seattle and extra day and also after my son had left there you’d also gotten diagnosed with reactive airway disease which could have been a lingering caused from that mold

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