Court defers decision on baby's care

A row over the medical treatment of a baby born with a disfigured face will be considered by the High Court on Wednesday.

Magistrates have ruled that the baby girl must stay in hospital until Wednesday evening.

The 24-hour interim care order was put in place after Newcastle social services asked magistrates to grant an emergency protection order.

The three-month-old girl became the subject of a police protection order at Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary after her parents threatened to remove her because doctors wanted to perform a tracheotomy to help her breathe.

'Experiment' claim

The baby girl's mother said: "So many doctors and nurses come in to watch her.

"She is being used for student purposes.

"I think the Royal Victoria Infirmary (RVI) is now a training school and they want my daughter to be an experiment."

The baby suffers from an unusual condition known as Goldenhar Syndrome.

Her parents object to a camera being put inside their child, saying the procedure has already been performed in Saudi Arabia, where she was born.

Baby's interests

When the interim care order under section 31 of the Children Act (1989) was put in place on Tuesday, Newcastle City Council said in a statement: "We are now legal parents of the child in conjunction with its parents".

The case raises questions over who has the final say in whether a child receives treatment - parents or medical staff.

John Wadham, director of civil rights group Liberty, said: "The way that the Human Rights Act works is that the parents will be able to put their side of the case and professionals will be able to put their arguments and the courts will have to resolve it.

"It is a difficult decision but the mechanisms and procedures are in place to resolve it."

One has to ask if there is an immediate need for a tracheotomy and whether there is an immediate need to involve the police

Dr Richard Nicholson, editor of the Bulletin of Medical Ethics

Dr Richard Nicholson, editor of the Bulletin of Medical Ethics, had told BBC Radio 4's Today programme the tracheotomy may not be needed because the baby had returned to Britain without it.

He said: "This child has travelled from the Middle East. It has travelled by aircraft with reduced levels of oxygen. It survived that apparently all right.

"So one has to ask if there is an immediate need for a tracheotomy and whether there is an immediate need to involve the police."

Life savings

But in a statement on Tuesday afternoon the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Hospitals NHS Trust had said: "To reduce the risk of respiratory arrest and likely death and then to prepare for any reconstructive surgery... the specialists unanimously concur that it would be in the best interests of the baby to firstly undergo an exploratory procedure to assess the airway and then if called for to progress with whatever treatment would secure adequate breathing."

The child's parents have already spent their £6,000 life savings on private hospital bills for the baby.

They have previously appealed for £500,000 to pay for up to 20 operations to construct the missing parts of her face.