Court Rules Brain-Damaged 12-year-old Archie Battersbee Life-support Can End

A High Court judge has today ruled that doctors can lawfully stop giving life support to brain-damaged 12-year-old Archie Battersbee.

Archie suffered a devastating brain injury three months ago and doctors treating him said that continued treatment is not in his best interests and should end.

His parents, Hollie Dance, 46, and Paul Battersbee, 56, from Southend in Essex, disagree.

Mr Justice Hayden, who reviewed evidence at a hearing in the Family Division of the High Court earlier this week, on Friday concluded that ending treatment was in Archie’s best interests.

He described what had happened to Archie as a ‘tragedy of immeasurable dimensions’.

Another High Court judge had earlier concluded that Archie was dead, but Court of Appeal judges upheld a challenge, made by Archie’s parents, to decisions taken by Mrs Justice Arbuthnot and said evidence should be reviewed.

Ms Dance urged Mr Justice Hayden to let Archie die a ‘natural death’. She said her son would want treatment to continue.

Doctors treating Archie at the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, east London, have told judges they think he is ‘brain-stem dead’ and say continued life support treatment is not in his best interests.

Archie has been in a coma since he was found unresponsive with a ligature around his neck at his home in Southend, Essex, on April 7.

Ms Dance believes her son, a talented gymnast, choked while taking part in a viral social media trend known as the ‘blackout challenge’ that first began circulating online 14 years ago. The youngster has not regained consciousness since.

Source: Daily Mail