Levi v Colgate-Palmolive Pty Ltd (1941) 41 SR (NSW) 48
Tort; Negligence; the duty of care; foreseeability of harm; plaintiffs with accentuated susceptibility to harm.
Facts: Colgate-Palmolive sent Levi a box of free sample products including a sachet of bath salts. Levi dissolved the bath salts in water and soaked herself in them for about 20 minutes. Afterwards she noticed that her skin had become red in parts and this rash spread, causing a troublesome itch that lasted a long time. The rash appeared to be the result of Levi's skin sensitivity to the bath salts.
Issue: Did a duty of care exist in respect of harm resulting from the plaintiff's individual abnormality, that is, her hypersensitive skin?
Decision: In the circumstances, there was no duty of care to persons with individual susceptibility to harm.
Reason: Jordan CJ said (at 52):
"Where the act is incapable of injuring an ordinary normal person, or is so done that, as done, it is incapable of injuring an ordinary normal person, the person who does it owes no duty to do more by reason only of the possibility that a person of abnormally accentuated susceptibility may be affected by it. Special circumstances may, of course, give rise to a duty to take special precautions to avoid injury to particular abnormal persons known to be likely to be affected by a particular act..."