Baby’s second chance at life after parents appeal judge’s decision on life support
An 8-month-old baby in the UK has been given more time to live after an appeal stayed a judge’s order to remove her from life support.
Judge Robert Peel ruled Wednesday that Indi Gregory would be taken off her life-support ventilator on Thursday against her parents’ wishes.
Now, the Gregory family has successfully launched an appeal for that mandate, hoping to negotiate the right to continue receiving treatment abroad.
Indi Gregory was born in February of this year and suffers from a degenerative mitochondrial disease that will most likely take her life.
In an attempt to escape the mandate to remove her from life support, the Gregorys made emergency arrangements with Vatican leaders for her to continue treatment at Bambino Gesù, a Catholic pediatric hospital in Rome.
The parents also obtained Italian citizenship for Indi directly from the Italian Prime Minister.
“They say there isn’t much hope for little Indi, but until the end I will do what I can to defend her life and defend her mom and dad’s right to do everything they can for her. ” Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni wrote this week on social media.
The Court of Appeals will hear the Gregorys’ case on November 10.
Doctors at Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham will not be allowed to take the baby off life support until the appeal process is concluded.
The Italian government has put heavy pressure on the UK courts to release the boy into its custody.
“Earlier today, as the clock is ticking, Indi’s Italian guardian submitted an urgent application to the UK High Court asking Judge Robert Peel to cede jurisdiction of the case under Article 9§2 of the Hague Convention. 1996,” religious legal group Christian Concern explained Friday.
Christian Concern hopes the increasingly international nature of the case will force the courts to back down, stating that “something like this has never happened before in an end-of-life case involving a child in the UK”.
