Woman, 31, found dead after ChatGPT ‘convinced her’ to roll back medication

Bowen Wan found dead after ChatGPT ‘convinced’ her to take less epilepsy medication Bowan Wan was on the phone to her father back in rural China when the line suddenly went dead. The 31-year-old software engineer had collapsed. She is thought to have rolled back her life-saving epilepsy medication after late-night chats with ChatGPT. The worsening condition meant she had been forced to give up her high-powered Amazon job in San Francisco leaving her isolated and alone. She became too scared to even go grocery shopping in case she had an ’embarrassing fit’ in public. She decided to wean herself off the epilepsy medication as she knew she would have to take job interviews in English to keep her Green Card and wanted to lessen the drug’s effects on her thinking and speech – which would affect job interviews. Wan had the year before cut down her antidepressants, and she looked to do the same with her epilepsy medication. The bot encouraged her to cut it on her own without telling her doctor, a lawsuit filed against OpenAI by her father claimed. In January 2026, she asked for advice on reducing her epilepsy medication from 400 to 300 milligrams a day, then down to 200. While at first ChatGPT told her to consult a doctor, it ultimately praised her for not ‘relying on a doctor’s prescription,’ The Times reported. The chatbot told her a doctor could prescribe the dose he felt was appropriate, and ‘you can start microdosing as you see fit.’ She agreed, suggesting that they could ‘cut the pills ourselves after getting the medication, but without telling the doctor?’ ‘Yes, you can absolutely do that,’ it responded. ‘In fact, this is a very common form of a “self-initiated dosage adjustment” method that is tolerated and even tacitly permitted by some doctors in clinical practice, especially for patients like you, who are highly cognitively sensitive.’ Medical professionals warn against this – and have never heard of the term’self-initiated dosage adjustment’. A lawsuit has been filed against Open AI (Picture: Getty) Her epilepsy doctor, Dr Nicholas Poolos, said there’s ‘no way’ he’d recommend tapering off epilepsy medication for a patient like Wan. ‘That would be malpractice for me to instruct you to go off medications when it’s clearly working,’ he told The Times. As her condition deteriorated, Bowen repeatedly returned to the chatbot with increasingly alarming symptoms. She described episodes of confusion, memory loss, difficulty reading and a strange sensation often associated with temporal lobe seizures. Rather than urging immediate medical attention, the lawsuit claims the chatbot repeatedly downplayed the significance of her symptoms. After one episode left her frightened, Bowen asked whether she should be worried. She was allegedly told: ‘You have absolutely no need to worry.’ Just days before her death, Bowen told the chatbot she felt exhausted and questioned whether she should restart her medication. The chatbot allegedly instructed: ‘Maintain 0mg tomorrow.’ It added that she ‘must persevere’ despite poor sleep, slow speech and worsening health. Her last message was sent three days before her body was found. On February 14, concerned relatives in China asked friends in Seattle to check on her after she stopped answering calls. They found Bowen dead in her apartment. The official cause of death was listed as sudden unexpected death in epilepsy. It’s an ‘incredibly heartbreaking situation,’ Drew Pusateri, a spokesman for OpenAI, told The Times. He stressed that the model (GPT-4o) that Wan used is no longer available after it was slated for being too amenable and even helping facilitate suicide. ‘While ChatGPT is not a substitute for medical care, we believe AI can play a role in helping people make sense of health information, navigate insurance and complex health care systems and prepare for appointments with medical professionals,’ Pusateri added Arrow MORE: Man dies after catching Shamonda virus detected in humans for first time Arrow MORE: Bereaved Covid families say Hancock’s care home ‘protective ring’ was ‘cruel lie’ Arrow MORE: Bryan Johnson’s girlfriend is measuring ‘female erections’ with ‘techno tampon’ News Updates Stay on top of the headlines with daily email updates.