§ 71.0055.Evidence of Pregnancy

An evidentiary requirement attached to one category of wrongful death claim.

In an action under this subchapter for the death of an individual who is an unborn child, the plaintiff shall provide medical or other evidence that the mother of the individual was pregnant at the time of the individual’s death.

The requirement follows from the definition of "individual" in the chapter, which includes an unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilisation until birth. A claim that can arise at any stage needs some proof that there was a pregnancy at all.

"Medical or other evidence" is deliberately open. Medical records are the obvious proof, but the section does not confine the plaintiff to them — which matters at an early stage, where a pregnancy may be known to the mother before it appears in any clinical record.

What the section asks for is narrow. Evidence of pregnancy at the time of death, and nothing more. It says nothing about causation, viability, or the stage of gestation, all of which are governed elsewhere.

The exceptions in the application provision are the real limits on this claim, and they are substantial: the wrongful death action for an unborn child does not lie against the mother, nor against a physician or health care provider for a lawful medical procedure, nor for a lawful dispensing or administration of a drug.

So this section addresses proof of the fact of pregnancy, while the surrounding provisions decide who may be sued at all.