The Sunday Times
Peter Zimonjic
November 12, 2006

THE Church of England has joined one of Britain's royal medical colleges in calling for legal euthanasia of seriously disabled newborn babies.

Church leaders want doctors to be given the right to withhold treatment from seriously disabled newborn babies in exceptional circumstances.

Their call, overriding the presumption that life should be preserved at any cost, follows that of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecology, revealed in The Sunday Times last week.

The church's position was laid out in a submission to an independent inquiry, due to publish its report this week, into the ethical concerns surrounding the treatment of severely premature babies.

In the submission Tom Butler, Bishop of Southwark, states: "It may in some circumstances be right to choose to withhold or withdraw treatment, knowing it will possibly, probably, or even certainly result in death."

The church's submission does not say which medical conditions might justify the decision to allow babies to die. It argues that there are "strong proportionate reasons" for "overriding the presupposition that life should be maintained".

It says it would support the withdrawal of treatment only if all reasonable alternatives had been considered, "so that the possible lethal act would only be performed with manifest reluctance".

In its proposal the college of obstetricians argued that "active euthanasia" should be considered for the overall good of families, to spare parents the emotional burden and financial stress of caring for desperately sick infants.

The college said in its submission to the inquiry: "A very disabled child can mean a disabled family. If life-shortening and deliberate interventions to kill infants were available, they might have an impact on obstetric decision-making, even preventing some late abortions, as some parents would be more confident about continuing a pregnancy and taking a risk on outcome."

Both submissions were made to the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, an independent body that publishes guidelines for how the medical profession should deal with ethical questions such as euthanasia.

The council was set up nearly two years ago in order to consider the implications of advances that enable infants to be born half- way through pregnancy.

In the Netherlands babies born before 25 weeks are not given medical treatment in certain conditions.

The report, to be published on Thursday, is not expected to set an age limit as a criterion.