Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans: Their Medico-Legal Journeys

Author(s): Kartina Aisha Choong / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans were two desperately ill children born to young first-time parents. They were treated at two renowned publicly-funded paediatric hospitals in England, namely the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust (GOSH) in London and the Aldey Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust (Alder Hey Hospital) in Liverpool. The cases first captured public attention when both sets of parents vehemently opposed the court declarations sought by the hospitals that it would be in the infants’ best interests to have their life-sustaining treatment (LST) withdrawn after the treating medical teams decided that the continuation of LST was futile and may even lead to the prolongation of pain and suffering. In each case, the declaration was granted by the High Court. In both, the parents appealed to the highest court in the land as well as to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg. However, none of the appeals managed to overturn the initial court declaration, and both infants died shortly after their LST was discontinued. This context-setting chapter chronicles their medico-legal journeys and concludes by reflecting on their legacies for similar cases in the near future.

The Vexed Question of Best Interests in Decisions Relating to Infants and Medical Futility

Author(s): Jo Samanta / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

Intractable disputes between doctors and parents relating to seriously ill infants are neither new, nor unusual. These tragic situations are invariably played out in very public arenas with potential repercussions for all parties concerned. The decision making standard employed by the courts is that of best interests, as objectively assessed by the court and taking all relevant matters into consideration. This chapter provides an examination and critique of the evolution of the best interests test when used in this area. It ends with a brief consideration of the possible role of mediation as a vehicle for alternative dispute resolution.

Do Parents Have a Right to Determine Where a Child Patient Dies?

Author(s): Lisa Cherkassky / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

This chapter will explore whether parents have the legal right to take their gravely ill child home to die in peace surrounded by family. Public anger surrounding the recent cases of Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans suggests that it is morally wrong to deprive parents of this final wish when medical treatment is futile and travel abroad for treatment has been ruled out. The judgments of Judge Francis (Gard) and Lady Justice King (Re C) will be examined to reveal the legal avenues available to parents of gravely ill children and whether their final wish to take their child home should be afforded more weight in futile cases.

Serving the Child’s “Best Interests” in Australia

Author(s): Roslyn Jones / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

Australia joined with the rest of the world in observing and commenting on the controversial debate over the fate of Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans. How Australia may have responded given similar scenarios will be explored in a number of ways. These will include considering our existing legislation, summarising the case law of comparable matters and analysing these cases in terms of issues of quality of life, professional obligations, parental versus state control and the use or misuse of media and social media in these situations.

Medical Futility in Czech Paediatrics

Author(s): Helena Krejčíková / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

In the Czech Republic, public debates regarding end-of-life decisions have only recently started. With no explicit legislative recognition of medical futility, clinical practice relies predominantly on a vague statutory definition of proper care and two non-binding guidelines, aimed however at adult patients. The situation in paediatrics is further complicated by the complex and often ambiguous legal regulation related to the process of decision making. In her contribution, the author introduces the Czech legal framework and clinical practice, including a new document prepared by the Paediatric Palliative Care Working Group on providing life-sustaining care, which would apply in cases similar to those of Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans.

The Application of End-of-Life Legislation to Minors in France

Author(s): Stephanie Rohlfing-Dijoux / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

This chapter explores how French Law would deal with legal problems relating to minors with incurable illnesses. In particular, the rules relating to therapeutic obstinacy, advanced directives and person of confidence would be examined. The question of how to conciliate the country’s special end-of-life legislation with the legal provisions concerning minors in family law and child protection law will be analysed, as will the fundamental rules on collective decision-making procedure in end-of-life situations.

Patient Autonomy and Best Interests in End-of-Life Cases

Author(s): Peter Elsner / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

The right to life is entrenched in the German Constitution mandating the state to abstain from unlawful incursions into human rights and to actively protect the enjoyment of human rights. Patient autonomy is derived from these basic rights. Maintaining or terminating medical support measures in end-of-life situation requires the patient’s consent which in minors may have to be decided by the courts based on the presumed will of the patient. Family values will have to be taken into account in establishing the presumed will of a child.

Gard and Evans

Author(s): Abhay Vaidya,Sourabhi Sahakari / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

Although Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans were treated in public hospitals where the costs of treatment were borne by the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), the management decisions were not influenced by cost implications, and health professionals acted in their patients’ best interests. By contrast, in a developing country such as India, very few government-funded hospitals match the resources of the NHS. Private healthcare is expensive, and socio-economic, cultural, religious, political and legal issues influence the treatment decisions. In this chapter, the authors analyse why the NHS is unique compared to developing countries such as India.

Medical Futility and Parental Paternalism in Turkey

Author(s): Banu Buruk,Berna Arda / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

The concept of futility is mainly dependent on the following question: “who will describe which treatment is futile and which is not?” Problem arises when the physician’s authority and the parents’ autonomy stand opposite to each other. There are several unique reasons for such disagreements in communitarian “we societies” like Turkey: relatives’ paternalistic attitude, the social environment, lack of medical information, the effect of the internet, and certain national daily news. Decision-making is also affected by cultural interactions, and of course the urgency of the medical condition of the child.

If We Can, Must We? Just Whose Best Interests Are We Talking About?

Author(s): Vincent F. Maher / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

The recent and tragic cases of Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans, each in the UK, and Jahi McMath in the USA, are proof positive that decisions made by individual clinicians or by teams in conference rooms or even in directives issued from the Court are neither immutable nor unchangeable. This chapter examines conflicts between clinicians and families, the role of social media and of the courts and concludes with recommendations about how to proceed in future similar cases.

Sophie Mereau-Brentano i jej droga do pisarstwa

Author(s): Renata Dampc-Jarosz / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

The article is an introduction to the life and work of the German classicromantic period writer Sophie Mereau-Brentano. It shows all those factors that influenced the formation of her poetic world and consolidated her position as one of the first professional German writers. Particular attention has been paid to the family home, the education gained thanks to the efforts of her father, her collaboration with Schiller, in whose magazine „Thalia” the young Sophie published her first poems, her marriage to Clemens Brentano and her friendship with Achim von Arnim. The article is also an attempt at the general characteristics of Sophie Mereau-Brentano’’ s writing, particularly emphasizing her creation of female characters, striving for self-determination, happiness and love. Much attention has also been paid to the position of the female writer, competing with the male-dominated publishing market. The dilemmas of the split between private life, the role of wife and mother and professional life, the writer, the publisher of a women’s magazine and a translator, the feminine and the masculine world of private and public space are an important key to understanding Sophie Mereau-Brentano’s work and her contemporary perception.

Sophie Mereau i Schiller

Author(s): Norbert Oellers / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

The subject of the article is a long-term relationship connecting Friedrich Schiller with Sophie Mereau-Brentano. The author of the article analyzes their private contacts and the influence of Schiller on the artistic development of Mereau. The research corpus consists of preserved correspondence, Mereau’s poetry published in Schiller‘s magazines and her diary.

Emancypacja jako rzeczywistość wyimaginowana w powieściach epistolarnych Sophie von La Roche i Sophie Mereau

Author(s): Karina Becker / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

Sophie von La Roche creates in her epistolary novel entitled Geschichte des Fräuleins von Sternheim [The History of Lady Sophia Sternheim] (1771) an image of a modern, emancipated woman that remains in opposition to the images of women and men of epistolary novels written by men, such as in Goethe‘s The Sufferings of Young Werther (1774). Sophie Mereau, on the other hand, in her epistolary novel Amanda und Eduard [Amanda and Ewdard] (1803) boldly takes up the taboo subject of extramarital sex and women‘s bodily sensations. Although the views of both writers were ahead of their time, they still remained merely an imaginary concept of femininity.

Problematyka artystowska w opowiadaniu „Marie” Sophie Mereau-Brentano

Author(s): Nina Nowara-Matusik / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

The main goal of the article is to reconstruct the discourse about the artist in the story Marie by Sophie Mereau-Brentano, with particular emphasis on the actress Marie. The author of the article shows that Mereau-Brentano develops an original concept of a female artist, synthesizing the thoughts of Rousseau, Plato, Shaftesbury, Kant, and Schiller, which in the historical-literary sense can be located between the Weimar classicism and romanticism.

„Amanda i Eduard”

Author(s): Sophie Mereau-Brentano / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

„Marie”

Author(s): Sophie Mereau-Brentano / Language(s): Polish Publication Year: 0

Virgil Madgearu: profesorul, omul cetăţii, doctrinarul (Full eBook)

Author(s): / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 2020

This volume is a collective work dedicated to the memory of Virgil Madgearu (1887-1940) a preeminent professor of the Academy of Higher Commercial and Industrial Studies, the innitial name of the Bucharest University of Economic Studies. Each chapter of the book reveals defining elements of Madgearu’s life and work, his beliefs, viewpoints and active involvement in the academic and institutional development of the university (1917-1940), in the interdisciplinary research of the economy and society, in shaping the Romanian peasant doctrine and promoting Europe wide the interests of agrarian countries, in assuming political responsibilities as parlamentarian or as member of various interwar governments. As a respected professor and a leading politician he vigorously rejected the presence and influence of extreme right movements in the society and that valiant attitude was at the origin of his assassination in November 1940.

Priča o dodatku ili kako poučavati suvremenu hrvatsku povijest?

Author(s): Snježana Koren / Language(s): Croatian Publication Year: 0

„Dodatak za najnoviju povijest" pobudio je u ljeto 2005. godine veliku pozornost hrvatske javnosti, svakako veću nego što to jedan (neobjavljeni i nedovršeni) udžbenički tekst obično izaziva. No priča o separatu traje mnogo duže od samog Dodatka. Seže još u vrijeme uoči reintegracije hrvatskog Podunavlja, kada je potpisom ministrice prosvjete i športa Ljilje Vokić uveden moratorij na poučavanje suvremene hrvatske povijesti od šk. god. 1997./98. do 2002./2003. u odjeljenjima u kojima se nastava izvodi na srpskom jeziku. Budući da je od šk. god. 2003./2004. prestajalo vrijediti prijelazno razdoblje, Ministarstvo prosvjete i športa, tada na čelu s ministrom Vladimirom Strugarom, započelo je potkraj 2002. godine s pripremama za početak učenja najnovije povijesti. Organiziran je konzultativni sastanak sa školskim djelatnicima u Osijeku (26. 1.), te savjetovanje u vezi s prestankom moratorija na nastavu najnovije povijesti u Zagrebu (17. 12.), na kojem sam sudjelovala kao autorica udžbenika za osmi razred. Tada nisu prihvaćeni prijedlozi o produžavanju moratorija, ali ni postignuta suglasnost o udžbeniku koji bi se u integralnom obliku preveo na srpski jezik. Umjesto toga, iznesena je ideja o izradi separata koji bi poslužio kao privremeno rješenje, te prvi korak ka ukidanju moratorija.

Dvije godine poslije

Author(s): Snježana Koren / Language(s): Croatian Publication Year: 0

Projekt izrade dopunskog materijala za poučavanje najnovije povijesti, utemeljenog na multiperspektivnom pristupu, 2005. godine nije realiziran. Pa ipak, Dodatak je imao svoj život i prije nego što je objavljen. S jedne strane, svakako je dio jedne globalne teme o uporabi povijesti, pa stoga ne čudi što je naišao na interes i izvan granica Hrvatske (dosad smo o njemu govorili na više međunarodnih skupova u Japanu, SAD-u, Italiji, Austriji, Njemačkoj, Velikoj Britaniji, Bosni i Hercegovini). S druge strane, Dodatak je u Hrvatskoj otvorio debate o poučavanju najnovije povijesti i pomogao da ova tema, kada je riječ o nastavi povijesti, znatno više nego prije postane dijelom javne domene. To je tim značajnije što je rasprava o njemu - kao i mnoge druge koje su se tijekom posljednjih petnaestak godina vodile o nastavi povijesti - započela s upravo suprotnim ciljem: onemogućavanja kritičkog sagledavanja otvorenih pitanja iz suvremene povijesti i nametanja određenih stavova. No neposredni utjecaj ovih rasprava bio je dvojak.

O povjesničarima, nakladnicima i politici: Prilog povijesti „Dodatka uz udžbenik najnovije povijesti' (tzv. separata)

Author(s): Nikša Stančić / Language(s): Croatian Publication Year: 0

Hrvatskim zakonskim odredbama predviđeno je da se u školama ili razredima s nastavom na jezicima nacionalnih manjina nastava održava prema nastavnom planu i program u jednakom za sve škole u Hrvatskoj i s istim udžbenicima prevedenim na jezik nacionalne manjine. No nastava povijesti u školama na srpskom jeziku u hrvatskom Podunavlju je 1997. godine, na inzistiranje „međunarodne zajednice", stavljena prvih pet godina nakon reintegracije (do kraja šk. god. 2002./3.) pod posebni režim. Nastanak „Dodatka uz udžbenik najnovije povijesti" tzv. separata) vezan je uz prestanak toga posebnog režima, a odluka o njegovoj izradi posljedica je političke odluke, dogovora Ministarstva prosvjete i športa koalicijske vlade na čelu sa SDP-om , odnosno ministra prosvjete dr. Vladimira Strugara (HSS) potkraj 2002. s predstavnicima srpske zajednice u Hrvatskoj. Tu je obvezu nakon formiranja vlade HDZ-a preuzelo na jesen 2004. i novoosnovano, objedinjeno Ministarstvo znanosti, obrazovanja i športa na čelu s ministrom dr. Draganom Primorcem.