IVF goes wrong, women gives birth to each other's babies

US: Two California couples gave birth to each other's newborns following a mix-up at a fertility clinic and spent months raising children who were not theirs before exchanging the babies, according to a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles.

Daphna Cardinale said that she and her husband Alexander had immediate suspicions that the girl she gave birth to in late 2019 was not theirs due to her darker complexion.

They crushed their doubts because they fell in love with the baby and entrusted the IVF process and their doctors, she said. Months later, learning that she had been pregnant with another couple's baby and that another woman had been pregnant caused lasting trauma, she told.

"I was inundated by feelings of fear, betrayal, anger and anguish," she said during a press conference with her husband when announcing the lawsuit. “They robbed me of the ability to carry my own baby. I never had the chance to grow up and connect with her during her pregnancy, to feel her kick from her. "

Cardinal's charge accuses the Los Angeles-based California Center for Reproductive Health (CCRH) and its proprietor, Dr. Eliran Mor, of medical malpractice, breach of contract, negligence and fraud. She demands a jury trial and seeks unspecified damages.

Yvonne Telles, the center's office administrator, declined to comment Monday. Mor could not be reached for a statement.

According to attorney Adam Wolf, the other two parents involved in the alleged confusion wish to remain anonymous and plan a similar lawsuit in the coming days, who represents the four parents.

The lawsuit claims that CCRH mistakenly implanted the other couple's embryo into Daphna and transferred the Cardinales embryo, made from Daphna's egg and Alexander's sperm, to the other woman.

The babies, both girls, were born a week separate in September 2019. Both couples unintentionally raised the wrong child for nearly three months before DNA testing confirmed the embryos were exchanged, according to the document.

"The Cardinals, including her little daughter, fell in love with this girl and were terrified that they would be taken from them," the complaint says. “All the time, Alexander and Daphna did not know the whereabouts of their own embryo and were therefore terrified that another woman had been pregnant with her child, and her child was somewhere in the world without them. ”.

The babies were exchanged in January 2020.

Confusions like this are extremely rare, but not unprecedented. In 2019, a Glendale, California couple sued a separate fertility clinic, claiming their embryo was mistakenly implanted into a New York woman, who gave birth to her child and a second child belonging to another couple.

Wolf, whose firm specializes in fertility cases, requested for greater overlooking of IVF clinics. "This case highlights an industry that desperately needs federal regulation," he said.

Breaking the news to her eldest daughter, who is now seven, that the doctors made a mistake and that the baby was not actually her sister "was the hardest thing in my life," Daphna said. "My heart breaks for her, maybe the most," she said.

Since the confusion came to light and the babies returned to their biological families, all four parents have made an effort to stay in each other's lives and "build a bigger family," Daphna said.

"They were as in love with our biological daughter as we were with theirs," Alexander said.