That's not an unreasonable question if I may say so. It's often debated by med and para students.
It comes down to something called 'capacity' that is whether the patient has the capacity to make an informed decision about their own treatment, welfare and care....dementia patients are a good example.
If the patient lacks capacity, then there's a medico-legal process that enables Doctors to make decisions on their behalf, which are in the interests of the patient. Harsh as it sounds, and as much as they're consulted t's only a courtesy that the nearest and dearest are consulted at all. The key point with capacity is that it's a clinical decision made in the interests of the patient.
It's worth considering that the best medical and legal minds not just in the UK, but also the EU, have pondered this poor lad and all come to the decision that he should not be moved out of the Hospital. Those same minds have also concluded that to do so, would cause unnecessary suffering.
But as I said before, palliative transfers are not uncommon and if it were lawful, I'd take the job
This kid is dying. It's just a matter of when.
Actually the parents case in court has been quite interesting here.
As a normal standard of British law, the ultimate decision regards anything to do with a child is that of their parents
The state can ONLY intervene if social services etc. can demonstrate that the actions of the parents have been negligent and/or the child has suffered/would suffer significant harm as a result. Until that legal ‘threshold’ has been crossed, the state has no authority to intervene.
What we are ultimately seeing here is the interplay between medical law (interests of the patient) and family law (the authority of a parent to make a decision on behalf of their child)
The court appears to accept that nothing the parents have done, or proposed to do, has amounted to causing Alfie significant harm (Q1. how can it if he is incapable of feeling pain? Q2. how can it if the alternative course of treatment proposed would lead to his death)
So the argument is, what legal right do the state have to decide what is best for Alfie when the law says that the state has no power to intervene.
An interesting conundrum that the court has essentially resolved by saying that Doctors have the legal duty to do whatever they think is in their patients best interests, regardless of the wishes if the parents, even if the course of action proposed by the parents would not cause the child significant harm.
In a country where Doctors are employed by the state that potentially creates a fairly major change in the relationship between the parent and the state that could easily cascade down the system. I suspect there will be ramifications of this decision for years to come.