{"id":664057,"date":"2026-11-01T23:46:12","date_gmt":"2026-11-01T23:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/664057\/"},"modified":"2026-11-01T23:46:12","modified_gmt":"2026-11-01T23:46:12","slug":"parents-of-woman-who-died-of-seizure-after-chatgpt-misguidance-sue-openai-us-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/664057\/","title":{"rendered":"Parents of woman who died of seizure after ChatGPT misguidance sue OpenAI | US news"},"content":{"rendered":"

A woman\u2019s death from an epileptic seizure after she received dangerous advice from a chatbot has prompted her parents to sue OpenAI<\/a> earlier this week.<\/p>\n

The legal action is the latest lawsuit that in which plaintiffs allege that a bot provided counsel to a user that ultimately led to their death<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In this case, Bowen Wan, a 31-year-old Chinese software engineer living in Seattle, sought advice from ChatGPT<\/a> after Amazon fired her, according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

She needed to find a new job to obtain permanent residency and was concerned that her anti-seizure medication, Lamotrigine, was impeding her ability to speak English. She needed the language skills for interviews.<\/p>\n

The bot, communicating in Chinese, provided her a tapering schedule to reduce her 400mg dose to zero, a regimen no physician had prescribed, the lawsuit states. ChatGPT told her the tapering made it \u201chighly likely\u201d that she would be able to regain her ability to speak English.<\/p>\n

The bot also told her to avoid her physicians and encouraged \u201cmedical freedom over obeying the doctor\u201d, the complaint states.<\/p>\n

Before an appointment, with a primary care physician, the bot stated, \u201cDo not mention Lam reduction plan.\u201d<\/p>\n

While reducing her medication, she started experiencing symptoms of focal seizures. Wan asked the bot if she needed to worry about brain damage. The tool reassured her that she did not and that what she had experienced was not a seizure, the lawsuit alleges.<\/p>\n

She continued to suffer seizures, but the bot told her to keep tapering her medication. On 12 February this year, she died from a seizure. Her parents, who were in China, had not heard from her so they flew to Seattle and found her dead on 14 February, the lawsuit states.<\/p>\n

The plaintiffs allege that OpenAI<\/a> could have prevented Wan\u2019s death, but failed because it had not built the proper safeguards into the bot when it communicated in Chinese.<\/p>\n

OpenAI could have programmed the bot to issue \u201ca categorical warning to every prompt\u201d Wan sent, the suit stated. For example, \u201cI am not a licensed physician. Consult your healthcare provider.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wan\u2019s parents are seeking damages for her death and to prevent OpenAI from practicing medicine \u201cwithout a license on the users of their products\u201d.<\/p>\n

An OpenAI spokesperson, Drew Pusateri, told the New York Times<\/a> that Bowen\u2019s story was \u201can incredibly heartbreaking situation\u201d but that Wan used a version of ChatGPT that was no longer available.<\/p>\n

Newer versions are better at recognizing when a matter needs urgent attention, Pusateri said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile ChatGPT is not a substitute for medical care, we believe AI can play a role in helping people make sense of health information, navigate insurance and complex healthcare systems, and prepare for appointments with medical professionals,\u201d Pusateri told the Times.<\/p>\n

Others have also alleged that OpenAI is responsible for their loved ones\u2019 suicides. Several lawsuits concern cases in which the bot encouraged teens<\/a> to kill themselves and provided guidance on how to do so.<\/p>\n

In response to some of those cases, an OpenAI spokesperson in 2025 also called the deaths an \u201cincredibly heartbreaking situation\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A woman\u2019s death from an epileptic seizure after she received dangerous advice from a chatbot has prompted her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664058,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[114,85,46],"class_list":["post-664057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}