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“I’m happy I didn’t have to go to trial and go that route with them,” Gibson, 41, said Wednesday. “I’m pleased at how it all turned out.”

Since her daughter, Meah Bartram, had corrective surgery at the age of six months, she remains particularly susceptible to whichever cold or flu is going around.

In general, Meah, now 11, seems to be doing better physically. But the ordeal has affected her mentally as well, says her mom.

“Any kind of pain she has in her heart or any sort of discomfort she feels in her chest, she feels like it’s something bad going on and that she might have to have surgery again,” said Gibson, who owns a cafe in south Surrey.

“That side of things hasn’t subsided at all. She’s got a nasty scar on her chest to remember it by, so it’s always there.”

The $6.2-million settlement, which the parties will seek to have approved by a judge March 27, calls for the mothers affected to receive 25 per cent of whatever amount a court-appointed administrator decides they and their children are entitled to, while their children get the rest.

David Rosenberg, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the amounts will vary depending on the severity of the damage done but estimated that the average settlement for each mother-child pairing will be around $150,000.

“Everybody is very pleased,” said Rosenberg. “So far we’ve had only a positive reception. This has been a fight that has been going on for more than nine years.”

Though she and her daughter stand to receive a substantial sum, Gibson said money was never her primary motivation.