Damages to MS crash chauffeur

The courts yesterday recognised for the first time that the incurable nerve disease multiple sclerosis can be triggered by the trauma of an accident.

Judge Anthony Kenny, sitting at the High Court, awarded more than pounds 300,000 damages to a former chauffeur who became a victim of the debilitating illness after suffering whiplash injuries in a collision with a fire engine. The judge accepted expert evidence that Joseph Kennedy began suffering from the disease after it was sparked by the accident in Kensington High Street, west London.