Parents of a terminally ill baby lose their final legal bid to take him to the USA for specialist treatment

A Terminally ill ten-month-old baby, Charlie Gard, will be allowed to die as his parents Chris Gard and Connie Yates have lost their final legal bid to take him to the USA for treatment, after specialists at the Great Ormond Street Hospital in London believe life support treatment for the boy, who suffers from a rare genetic condition and has brain damage, should stop.

The specialists insist that the therapy proposed by a doctor in the US is experimental and would not help. Charlie's parents took their fight to the European Court of Human Rights after losing battles in the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court in London, and their lawyers argued that the family's human rights were being undermined. They also insisted that Charlie's right to life and liberty were being violated.

The European judges refused to intervene, agreeing that undergoing experimental treatment would continue to cause Charlie harm.