Hard luck, my little lass. It's not in your best interest to breathe.

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Aug 25, 2005

The parents of a brain-damaged baby in the UK have lost their appeal of a court order that rules she should be allowed to die if she stops breathing. The doctors, not the parents, have the call. Here speaks the spokeswoman for the company that owns the hospital:

"Our doctors and nurses, who have spent so much time caring for Charlotte, share the pleasure of her parents that she has some sense of sight, some sense of hearing and that she is showing signs of improvement with her breathing.

"However, Portsmouth Hospital Trust is content that the Court of Appeal today has upheld the right of our clinicians not to ventilate Charlotte if they judge it would not be in her best interests.

"We would assure her parents, the courts and the public as a whole that indeed our doctors and nurses will continue to give Charlotte the best possible quality of care for the foreseeable future."

Charlotte's parents have the assurances of the physicians' billing service that "the best" will be done for their baby -- death not excluded. Now who could object to that?