High Court judge says doctors can stop life-support treatment for severely ill eight-week-old boy against his parents’ wishes
- Mr Justice Hayden ruled that specialists can lawfully stop providing life support
- The eight-week-old baby had been diagnosed with necrotising enterocolitis
- Doctors have said that the baby would die in pain if he be allowed to die naturally
Doctors can stop providing life-support treatment to an ill eight-week-old baby against his parents’ wishes, a High Court judge has ruled.
Mr Justice Hayden said specialists could lawfully move the severely-ill boy, who has a severe liver impairment, to a palliative care regime after doctors said that there was no prospect of the baby surviving.
The High Court judge was told that while the boy’s parents supported the efforts doctors and nurses they felt that stopping life-support treatment was against their Muslim beliefs.
However doctors said the baby could not breathe without the aid of a ventilator and would die in pain if allowed to die naturally.
A High Court judge has ruled that doctors can stop providing life-support treatment to a severely-ill eight-week-old baby against his parents’ wishes
Today Mr Justice Hayden said ending intensive care was in the boy’s best interests.
The child, who had been in intensive care since he was three days old, had been diagnosed with necrotising enterocolitis, a condition, commonly known as NEC, which causes tissues in the intestine to become inflamed and start to die.
He made a ruling late on Tuesday after considering the case at a virtual hearing in the Family Division of the High Court.
The judge, who is based at the Royal Courts of Justice in London, said it was the first time he had been asked to make such a decision about a child at a virtual hearing.
Judges are currently overseeing hearings remotely because of the coronavirus crisis.
Bosses at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust have responsibility for the baby’s care and had asked the judge to decide what moves were in his best interests.
They said they had hoped that an agreement could be reached with the boy’s parents without the need for a court hearing.
The judge considered evidence at a private hearing and said journalists could report the case but said the baby could not be identified.
Mr Justice Hayden said ending intensive care for the eight-week-old baby was in his best interests
The baby’s parents, who were not represented by lawyers, watched proceedings on a mobile phone from hospital while sitting near their son.
His father addressed the judge and argued that life-support treatment should continue.
Covid-19 restrictions meant that he had not been able to visit hospital when his son was born, he said.
At one point the judge asked lawyers, and a reporter, to log out of the virtual hearing so he could look at the baby, via the father’s mobile, with the parents.
Mr Justice Hayden said the baby’s parents held ‘profound’ Islamic beliefs and the boy’s father argued that while there was breath there was life, and while there was life there was hope.
He said: ‘However, the clinical team are satisfied that there is no prospect of (the boy) surviving.
‘The challenge is to ensure that his death is as comfortable and as dignified and as free from pain as can practically be achieved.’
He added: ‘I believe it is in the best interests of (the boy) to stop intensive care to move to palliative care.
‘I am satisfied that intensive care is futile.’
Mr Justice Hayden told the baby’s parents: ‘I am so sorry.’