Charlie Gard. Doctors should be allowed to end his suffering

There’s a lot in the news that I can happily gloss over – political point-scoring, financial shenanigans and most of what is happening in sport. But the Charlie Gard story has gripped me in the same way that it has gripped every parent. And it is inescapable. If it’s not in the headlines, his parents will pop up on a chat show, commentators will be live-tweeting from the latest court hearing, or my Facebook timeline will be filling up with blue hearts and pleas for me to ‘Pray for Charlie’.

I don’t pray, but that little boy and the plight of his parents – and the hospital staff who are doing their utmost for him – is in my thoughts. And not just mine. The Pope and The Donald have weighed into the argument too.

So what do we know? We know that Charlie is a little boy, yet to reach his first birthday, who is gravely ill. He is being kept alive by life support machines and is unable to move or hear. Charlie’s doctors at Great Ormond Street Hospital say he has severe, irreversible brain damage and that he shows signs of being in pain. They don’t wish to prolong his life. Unable to reach agreement on the matter with his parents, they applied to the courts to switch off his life support.

Charlie’s parents are understandably very upset. They believe there is hope for their son, and have fought the hospital through the courts. They wish their son to travel to America to try an experimental new treatment – so new that it has not been tested on any patients with Charlie’s condition – which they hope may halt the deterioration of the disease. They believe he deserves a chance.

The intervention of the Pope (the Vatican’s Children’s Hospital apparently have ‘new evidence’ to bring to the case) and Donald Trump, along with hundreds of thousands who have signed petitions and campaigned to ‘save Charlie’, has brought Great Ormond Street Hospital back to court this week to hear the ‘new evidence’ of what that treatment could do for their tiny, helpless patient.

Whatever the outcome in this case there is unlikely to be a happy outcome for Charlie. His parents deserve every sympathy for the situation in which they find themselves; no parent should ever have to contemplate switching off life support for their child. It is every parent’s duty to fight for their child as hard as they can and for as long as it takes. But there must be limits.

Those limits must be when doctors – whose very purpose is to preserve life – are saying that they can do no more. And when medical staff, highly trained, professional and ethical, are saying that the time has come to end the suffering. Then it is time for Charlie parents to spend time with their son, make peace with their situation, and let him slip away.

I cannot imagine being in that situation – I hope with all of my being that it never happens. And I can’t imagine that Charlie’s parents could have done more for him than they have already. They have loved him. They have fought for him – publicly, globally, and with every piece of ammunition they could find. If the Vatican Hospital’s new evidence suggests that Charlie travelling to the US is in his best interests, the courts may decide this week to accede to his parents’ wishes. But I doubt that they will.

This week’s court ruling might be the sign Chris Gard and Connie Yates need to draw a line, to quietly thank us for our interest, but ask us to now respect their privacy as a family. And for them to say their final goodbyes.