A woman’s death from an epileptic seizure after she received dangerous advice from a chatbot has prompted her parents to sue OpenAI earlier this week.
asserted
she → receive → OpenAI
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.
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that → allege → death
In this case, Bowen Wan, a 31-year-old Chinese software engineer living in Seattle, sought advice from ChatGPT after Amazon fired her, according to the lawsuit.
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Amazon → live → lawsuit
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.
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medication → need → English
She needed the language skills for interviews.
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She → need → interviews
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.
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lawsuit → communicate → regimen
ChatGPT told her the tapering made it “highly likely” that she would be able to regain her ability to speak English.
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she → tell → English
The bot also told her to avoid her physicians and encouraged “medical freedom over obeying the doctor”, the complaint states.
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complaint → tell → doctor
Before an appointment, with a primary care physician, the bot stated, “Do not mention Lam reduction plan.”
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bot → state → plan
While reducing her medication, she started experiencing symptoms of focal seizures.
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she → reduce → seizures
Wan asked the bot if she needed to worry about brain damage.
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she → ask → damage
The tool reassured her that she did not and that what she had experienced was not a seizure, the lawsuit alleges.
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lawsuit → reassure → what
She continued to suffer seizures, but the bot told her to keep tapering her medication.
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bot → continue → medication
On 12 February this year, she died from a seizure.
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she → die → 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.
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lawsuit → hear → February
The plaintiffs allege that OpenAI could have prevented Wan’s death, but failed because it had not built the proper safeguards into the bot when it communicated in Chinese.
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it → allege → Chinese
OpenAI could have programmed the bot to issue “a categorical warning to every prompt” Wan sent, the suit stated.
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suit → program → prompt
Wan’s parents are seeking damages for her death and to prevent OpenAI from practicing medicine “without a license on the users of their products”.
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parents → seek → products
An OpenAI spokesperson, Drew Pusateri, told the New York Times that Bowen’s story was “an incredibly heartbreaking situation” but that Wan used a version of ChatGPT that was no longer available.
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that → tell → ChatGPT
Newer versions are better at recognizing when a matter needs urgent attention, Pusateri said.
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Pusateri → recognize → attention
“While 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,” Pusateri told the Times.
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Pusateri → believe → Times
Others have also alleged that OpenAI is responsible for their loved ones’ suicides.
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OpenAI → allege → suicides
Several lawsuits concern cases in which the bot encouraged teens to kill themselves and provided guidance on how to do so.
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bot → concern → guidance
In response to some of those cases, an OpenAI spokesperson in 2025 also called the deaths an “incredibly heartbreaking situation”.
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spokesperson → call → deaths
The Aporia
