2 cases are reported of pregnancy following sterilization. In the 1st case, sterilization was performed simultaneously with a cesarean delivery in 1981. Subsequently, the mother of 2 took no precautions against pregnancy and in 1983 the plaintiff was delivered of a healthy baby. She sued for negligence and sought damages for the upkeep of her child. The woman claimed that she was not warned of the possibility of sterilization failure and that, though she would in any event have undergone the operation, she and her husband would have used birth control. On February 18, 1987, the judge dismissed her claim, finding that in 1981 there was no duty to warn a patient that sterilization might fail. There was, in 1981, a substantially respectable body of medical opinion which would not have warned a patient in these circumstances. However, the judge found that she had in fact been warned before the operation both by the consultant in May 1981 and by the houseman who took her consent to the operation. Nor did the judge accept that a woman, once sterilized, would resort to coctraception. In the 2nd case, a 25-year-old woman with a family had undergone laparoscopic sterilization on July 6, 1981. The gynecologist advised her not to take the contraceptive pill for 1 month prior to the operation. Unknown to the plaintiff and the defendants, the woman was in early pregnancy at the time of sterilization. The pregnancy was diagnosed on August 25 and on February 11 a healthy boy was born. The plaintiff sued, alleging negligent treatment and advice. It was her case that she had been told that no contraceptive measures of any kind would be required for the month preceding the operation because that operation would deal with any pregnancy; that the sterilization had been performed without ensuring that she was not pregnant; and that a dilatation and curettage should have been done at the time of laparoscopy. The judge held that there was a conflict of recollection about what the doctor had said, but he concluded that the defendant gynecologist was a very careful practitioner and that it would have been his practice to advise discontinuance of the pill and the adoption of other methods in the period prior to the operation because sterilization would not affect a current pregnancy. The gynecologist advised discontinuation of the pill because an earlier patient had had a near-fatal stroke in similar circumstances. The judge said that this practice was indicated as was his policy of dilatation and curettage only if it was diagnostically indicated. The judge found that the plaintiff had been advised to use alternative birth control measures or abstain from sexual intercourse.