This is a joke, right? Right?

[IrisAlthea]

A car insurance company has to pay $5.2 million to a woman who claims she caught a sexually transmitted infection (STI) in a Hyundai Genesis.

"If you think about it as an injury sustained while in that person's vehicle, then it totally falls within what an insurance company would be required to pay," personal injury attorney Miguel Custodio told Mail Online.

"Usually, injuries to passengers are the result of a collision, or slamming the door on one's fingers, that sort of thing. But while a lawsuit over contracting an STD from the insured driver may be the first of its kind, this award shows that it's not a stretch for someone to file against an insurance company for any actions occurring in a motor vehicle."

https://www.iflscience.com/car-insu...wAMvnWWjpIpwjk7JIqexWrmOfBBi634qtBoxSm5oue0Qg

I checked severat times to make sure it wasn’t The Onion…

I mean, my car already reminds me not to forget the phone. Will it remind me to inform people of my sexual history too now or will there be a clause in my car insurance that I can’t have unprotected sex in my car?

 

[MeekMe]

Your insurance is just going to get some special exclusions added once the industry lawyers figure out the wording. If you read your current policy in detail it likely has some interesting exclusions already. They won’t tell you not to have sex in your car, just that if you do they aren’t paying for any mishaps.

 

[DaddyforhisKitten]

It's ultimately not really that much different than someone injuring themselves on your property and filing a claim with your homeowners insurance.
And in this specific case, it probably didn't help matters that the individual with the STI knew they had it and didn't notify the woman in question beforehand.

 

[twister947]

It's a slippery slope. What if someone enters a home, and catches Coronavirus from an asymptomatic family member?

 

[MeekMe]

It's a slippery slope. What if someone enters a home, and catches Coronavirus from an asymptomatic family member?

I didn’t read the article but there was likely a need to prove the person knew they were infected before having sex. They also likely needed to demonstrate that it had to be in the car. An asymptomatic coronavirus carrier wouldn’t know unless they were testing regularly and then didn’t take precautions.

The likely reason they involved the insurance company was so they could actually get a payout. If you sue and win against a broke person, that money isn’t coming from thin air. The liability insurance is what kicked in when they could prove it was an injury caused by the car owner in their car.

Same as mentioned above, if you have liability insurance for your home, it would be there incase the injured party sues you. This isn’t just for getting sick. Say you’ve been holding off on fixing that loose step at your front door and an invited guest (even an uninvited guest) trips and gets injured, they can sue you. And if you have the appropriate insurance coverage, your insurance company will payout.

 

[IrisAlthea]

I didn’t read the article but there was likely a need to prove the person knew they were infected before having sex. They also likely needed to demonstrate that it had to be in the car. An asymptomatic coronavirus carrier wouldn’t know unless they were testing regularly and then didn’t take precautions.

The likely reason they involved the insurance company was so they could actually get a payout. If you sue and win against a broke person, that money isn’t coming from thin air. The liability insurance is what kicked in when they could prove it was an injury caused by the car owner in their car.

Same as mentioned above, if you have liability insurance for your home, it would be there incase the injured party sues you. This isn’t just for getting sick. Say you’ve been holding off on fixing that loose step at your front door and an invited guest (even an uninvited guest) trips and gets injured, they can sue you. And if you have the appropriate insurance coverage, your insurance company will payout.

Yes, they knew and didn’t inform that they were infected.
So far I get it, even if HPV is treated differently in Sweden than in the US. It’s so prevalent here that most sexually active people catch it sooner or later. It doesn’t fall under the the communicable diseases act here, so no contact tracing and no notification obligation.

What baffled me was how it would be tied to the car insurance, but if it is connected to a liability insurance, I understand it better.

Liability insurance where I am, is usually tied to the person and usually bought as a part of your home insurance. Same with legal protection insurance.
The liability covered by vehicle insurance and dog insurance, is usually related to driving and dog owning, because there you have a strict liability whether there was negligence or not.

Also, damages here are not on a scale that is anywhere near the numbers you read about people getting in the US.

 

[ouchfeelsgood]

I wonder if the claim was covered under "no fault" insurance.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Courtney Milan has a thread about it:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1535365774621126656

As far as I can tell from her discussion: although the STI angle is unusual, it's pretty common to have cases where a person is suing somebody who they know, with the insurance company on the hook if they win. I'm a passenger in my friend's car, he crashes, I get injured and sue him, that sort of thing.

Obviously there's potential for collusion and fraud in that kind of situation. So insurance normally has a clause stipulating that the insurer gets to run the defense in that lawsuit, to prevent the defendant from just rolling over and say "oh no, you win, I owe you a million dollars which is going to be paid by my insurance company and not me".

There are a couple of conflicting versions of what happened, but one version is that Geico opted not to get involved in the lawsuit because they believed it to be outside the coverage of the insurance (and so none of their business), and were mistaken about that. Other version is that they didn't get enough notification about the hearing.

Either way, it went to arbitration, where the parties try to come to agreement on a settlement... and they agreed to settle for the maximum the insurance would cover. Which I expect is a lot more than would likely have been awarded by a court if the guy had fought it.

TLDR if the insurance company does end up paying ouf $5m for this, it'll be because they misunderstood the coverage of their own policy. If so, they probably won't make that mistake a second time.

 

[IrisAlthea]

although the STI angle is unusual, it's pretty common to have cases where a person is suing somebody who they know, with the insurance company on the hook if they win. I'm a passenger in my friend's car, he crashes, I get injured and sue him, that sort of thing.

Yes, it was the not being related to the car or driving, that confused me.

Geico opted not to get involved in the lawsuit because they believed it to be outside the coverage of the insurance (and so none of their business), and were mistaken about that.

And perhaps the insurance company too then.

Either way, it went to arbitration, where the parties try to come to agreement on a settlement... and they agreed to settle for the maximum the insurance would cover. Which I expect is a lot more than would likely have been awarded by a court if the guy had fought it.

That explains a bit more too.

 

[gracie920101]

The lawyer that convinced her to go thru with this suit is my hero.

I wondering how he is at selling bridges?