Compensation for brain damage caused by cerebral palsy

A girl who suffered brain damage as a baby has been awarded £6.5m in compensation.

Melissa Salamanca, 11, who has cerebral palsy, had no abnormalities following her birth at Greenwich Hospital, south east London, in September 1996, and was discharged the same day.

But midwives who visited her at home realised she had jaundice and arranged for her to be treated at a hospital three days later.

She received phototherapy and an exchange blood transfusion, but her legal team claimed she would have been unhurt if her condition had been treated earlier.

Mr Justice Keith, at London's High Court, approved the award against Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Trust and Greenwich Healthcare NHS Trust on the basis of 100% liability.

He said her parents, Diego and Maria, of Brockley, near Lewisham, had shown "consummate devotion" over the "enormously trying" years, and wished them well for the future.

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