Couples from Pennsylvania and Ohio are reportedly suing University Hospitals following the storage tank malfunction March 4.
Two couples who were affected by a storage tank failure are suing an Ohio fertility clinic after reportedly losing their frozen embryos.
Amber and Elliot Ash of Bay Village, Ohio had two embryos stored at the facility and filed a lawsuit this past weekend against University Hospitals.
"There is nothing worse than being told that these embryos that you worked so hard to create and invested so much of your time, your physical self, emotional self, financial piece. They are gone. They are gone in an instant," Amber Ash told WOIO.
Amber and Elliot Ash join a second couple, that one from Pennsylvania, who've filed suit against University Hospitals after a attorneys say as many as 700 others have been affected.
Attorney Lydia Floyd with Peiffer Rosca Wolf Abdullah Carr & Cane, who's representing one of the couples, says she hopes the suit will bring changes so something like this never happens again.
Meanwhile, in what experts have called a stunning coincidence, reports have emerged that a second clinic on the other side of the country suffered an unrelated storage malfunction the same day.
Pacific Fertility Center in San Francisco announced on Monday that its equipment temporarily failed, possibly damaging hundreds of eggs and embryos, CBS News reports.
California attorney Adam Wolf is representing patients of Pacific Fertility Center who he says are planning to file a class action lawsuit this week.
"Never in their worst nightmares does that embryo become not viable because of conduct or misconduct of the clinic," Wolf said.
Pacific Fertility Center says they've undertaken a thorough review of their storage equipment and protocols following the incident.
University Hospitals officials said that that they are determined to help the patients who lost eggs and embryos, and that the lawsuit will not affect an independent review, per the Associated Press.
Pacific Fertility Center said the malfunction was due to a drop in liquid nitrogen levels that was "immediately rectified" and that the embryos were transferred to a new tank.
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