Judge rules portion of state’s newborn blood screening program violated rights of children

SAGINAW COUNTY, Mich. (WJRT) A judge has once again found key parts of Michigan’s newborn blood-testing program unconstitutional.

It’s a case that we first told you about in 2018 as a lawsuit was brought by four mid-Michigan parents.

They raised concerns about how leftover samples are used after screening for rare diseases and this ruling is likely to have an impact on how the state stores millions of blood samples and makes them available for research.

This new ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Ludington says that the Fourth Amendment rights of nine children were violated.

Under the Newborn Screening Program, the State of Michigan collects samples of newborn babies’ blood and tests it for various medical conditions.

What happens to those blood samples after the testing is the focus of his decision.

Michigan must have permission from parents to use spots for outside research.

But attorney Phil Ellison has argued the request for consent was “misleading, it was incomplete and didn’t have all the details.”

Ellison says those blood samples are stored at the Michigan Neonatal Biobank in Detroit, which then sells them for research and lets law enforcement get access to them, which many parents don’t realize.

Judge Ludington in the past has ruled the constitutional rights of the four parents named in the lawsuit were violated, and now he is says the children’s rights were violated as well, and wants the state to give the plaintiff’s options, which include returning the infants’ blood samples and data or destroying their blood samples and data.

Ellison says Judge Ludington “got the decision absolutely correct and this restores the right to make decisions about children back into the hands of moms and dads.”

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services could appeal this ruling and they were looking into what was next for this newborn baby screening program, but they did not release a response today.