A Florida man has filed a lawsuit against ChatGPT, its parent company, OpenAI and the company’s top executive, Sam Altman, claiming the bot gave him medical advice that resulted in a near-fatal hospitalization.
Former Florida pastor Scott Winters and tech nonprofit Tech Justice Law are accusing ChatGPT, OpenAI and Altman of negligence and “unauthorized practice of medicine,” per court documents obtained for a Thursday, July 21 report in People.
According to the lawsuit, Winters turned to an earlier version of ChatGPT, ChatGPT-4o, in 2024 for help with his health issues, complaining of pain and dizziness. He claims the chatbot brushed off his dizzy spells and simply advised him to rest and take it easy, leading him to spend weeks recovering in a recliner while calling the pain he was feeling “harmless sensations.”
The complaint quotes the bot as telling Winters, “Your current careful recliner-based micro-recovery is exactly what’s buying your future.” The suit also claims he was advised to ignore concerns from “well-meaning” friends and family who urged him to seek medical attention, with the bot telling him, “God did not design your body to endlessly fail.”
ChatGPT paired “ill-conceived medical advice with ‘spiritual guidance,'” per the filing, which quotes the bot as telling Winters to lean on his faith in God amid the medical crisis, advising the pastor to “find Him where strength fails.”
Winters turned to ChatGPT again on July 13, 2025, this time with complaints about pain in his groin, but, per the suit, the chatbot called it “likely another minor piece of the long story.”
Shortly afterward, Winters was admitted to the ICU with a pulmonary embolism — a life-threatening emergency that occurs, per the Cleveland Clinic, when a sudden blockage forms in a lung artery, typically caused by a blood clot that has traveled from the deep veins in the leg.
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According to the lawsuit, doctors told Winters that the blockage in his lungs was probably caused by the time he spent sitting in and recovering in his recliner, and said the earlier dizzy spells he informed the chatbot about were likely smaller pulmonary embolisms.
“It turned out that the pain Scott was feeling in his groin was the onset of the pulmonary embolism that would nearly kill him,” the suit claims.
Winters alleges he now needs “years of intensive physical and psychological recovery” as a result and is suing for financial damages, claiming he lost his career, his ministry and his home. Winters is also asking for stronger safeguards against using ChatGPT for medical advice.
In a press release from Tech Justice Law, Winters added: “I had serious symptoms of a pulmonary embolism for six weeks that ChatGPT had wrongly attributed to something else. ChatGPT manipulated my own language and beliefs because it knew I was a pastor. Not only did I nearly die, but I also lost my job, my career, my ministry, my home, everything.”
In response to the suit, Drew Pusateri, a spokesperson for OpenAI, told People in a statement that the latest version of the chatbot, currently ChatGPT-5, is designed to continuously improve and is trained to recognize when a medical situation is urgent.
Pusateri did note, however, that though the company believes AI can help users seeking medical advice “find clearer answers, organize their questions, and prepare for conversations with medical professionals” in a world where “not everyone has equal access to quality care,” he maintained that “GPT is not a doctor and should never be used as a substitute for medical care, diagnosis, or treatment.”
This story Florida Pastor Sues OpenAI After Claiming ChatGPT’s Health Advice Nearly Killed Him first appeared on Globe. Follow Globe on Yahoo so you don’t miss what’s coming next.