Blood type paternity test back in the 90's?

Welcome to Fluther.

If you’re talking about a child who was born in the 90s, then that child is nearly at (if not already at, or past) the age of majority in the USA. If your husband has had no dealings or relations with the child (or its mother) other than the provision of child support over that time – which would be nearly impossible to recoup at this late date, I’m sure – then what would be the point of establishing the child’s actual paternity? (That is, for your husband. It may mean a great deal to the child, to the child’s mother and potentially even to the child’s ‘actual’ father, if that’s not your husband.)

Why do you THINK it might be “worth it” to establish other paternity or to confirm your husband’s involvement? If I were you then I’d ask and answer that question before going further.

It it was just a blood type test, then the odds are divided by the number of potential fathers who have the same blood type.

So just knowing there is one drops the odds to less than 50%. I’m not sure what the 97.851% figure represents (test error that that’s even his blood type?), but even so if you know two partners were the same type, but there are other partners of unknown type, the odds are just statistical but would be 50% at most (each unknown person could also have the same type). If you knew anything about her, you might be able to make some more guesses based on what she looks like or other traits in common or not.

Though as CWOTUS wrote, whether it’s worth trying to find out is entirely subjective and probably best determined by studying your thoughts and feelings about why you want to know and what it would lead to. If the other people in that family are difficult, then I would consider the impact on everyone of having to interact with them.

The only way to know for sure is to run a DNA test on both your husband and “the child”, who is no longer a child, and does not have to cooperate.

So, I pose the same question as @CWOTUS why do you wish to reopen an old wound?

A blood type test cannot tell you how likely it is that someone is a child’s father. All it can do is tell you whether someone has the same blood type as the child. That information can then be used, along with the blood type of the mother, to determine whether or not it is possible for the man to be the child’s father. But it’s a binary thing: it’s either possible or not possible. Assuming that the 97.851% figure was not completely made up, it either refers to the reliability of the test (“it is 97.851% likely that the two people tested have the same blood type”) or they actually did more than just test for his blood type (“it is 97.851% that you are the father based on blood type and other genetic markers that we looked at”).

Anyway, I’m going to join the “why revisit this?” crowd. He can’t get the money back. He already has no relationship with the child. It changes nothing, except possibly making him angry. And honestly, if the worst thing that happened every time we were taken advantage of was that a child got taken care of, the world would be a whole lot better of a place. Unless the child is really concerned with who her father is, let it go.

I disagree with the ‘why revisit this’ crowd.

Why wouldn’t this be important to at least know?

@MrGrimm888 Because it is intruding on the child’s life. That is no one else’s privilege to make. The “father” passed on his say in the matter years ago. The “wife” has no justification except feeding a resentment from before she was married.

@CWOTUS I can think of a few reasons it may be actually important to know the biological father when it comes to inherited diseases/disorders/matching for organ donor. IMHO

Yes, @si3tech, and that’s why I included the qualifier about the child and/or its mother. The potential non-father … not so much, and his wife … not at all.

If it was 97.851% likely, then my guess is it wasn’t a blood “type” test it was a DNA test. Blood typing can rule people out, and offers a possibility of who might be a parent, but blood type testing is nothing near 100% unless it is ruling someone out.

For instance, a type O person can have a parent who is type O, A, or B blood types. That’s actually type OO, AO, BO, because we get our type from each parent, so we are all a combination blood type. O is like zero, so AO is simply A for the basic purposes of blood typing. An A can also be AA, meaning each parent gave A to the child.

Type B can have a parent with O, AB, or B, or even A, if the A parent is AO and not AA. It also partly depends on what type the other parent is. Because if you have an AO parent, then to get a B child the other parent must be B or AB. The child has to get the B from someone. Does that make sense? I’m probably not explaining it well. The AO parent gives their O, and the other parent gives a B, and then that child is BO, or what we would simply call B blood type.

A type AB parent cannot have a type O child, so that rules out if that were the case, but your husband obviously wasn’t ruled out.

I think do it again if your curious, and if his daughter is interested too. I think they had a DNA test, but if it’s really bothering you, and no one involved has an objection then go ahead.

He paid child support, but didn’t have a relationship with her? Is that right?