PICTURES RELEASED BY FAMILY YESTERDAY
AUGUST 4, 2016: Charles Matthew William Gard is born at 8lb 3oz to first-time parents Connie Yates and Chris Gard.
LATE SEPTEMBER 2016 – At eight weeks old Charlie begins to lose weight and strength, soon choking on his milk.
OCTOBER 2016 – Charlie is taken to hospital and transferred to Great Ormond Street where tests reveal he has mitochondrial depletion syndrome. His strain of the disease is so rare he is believed to be only the 16th sufferer in the world.
AUTUMN 2016 – Charlie’s lungs become too weak to function without the help of a mechanical ventilator. Miss Yates, 31, finds a specialist in the US involved in testing nucleoside therapy on sufferers of the condition. It has helped save some patients, but had never been tried on anyone with Charlie’s rare type.
JANUARY 2017 – Great Ormond Street doctors look into giving Charlie the drug, but say treatment would be futile as his seizures have caused irreversible brain damage. Charlie’s parents then make contact with the American doctor.
MARCH 2017 – Great Ormond Street asks the High Court to let Charlie Gard die. Mr Justice Francis gives his parents a month to make their case for the pioneering treatment in the US. They ask the public for help to reach the £1.2million needed to travel to the US. Within days Daily Mail readers help to raise £197,000
APRIL 2017 – Charlie’s parents hit the £1.2million target. Over a three-day High Court hearing, Charlie’s parents beg Mr Justice Francis to give their boy a chance. But Charlie’s doctors tell the court he is blind, deaf, brain damaged and likely to be suffering. Mr Justice Francis sided with the doctors and ruled they must ‘let him slip away peacefully.
MAY 2017 – Charlie’s parents go to the Court of Appeal but judges later uphold the High Court decision. His parents then appeal to the Supreme Court.
JUNE 2017 – On June 8 the Supreme Court formally turns down Charlie’s last hope of survival. On June 27, European judges back the British doctors who said it would be kinder to let him die. Pope
Francis then intervenes, with Charlie later offered treatment at the Vatican hospital.
JULY 3 – Donald Trump risks a diplomatic row with the UK by declaring America’s support for saving Charlie. He later tweets he would be ‘delighted’ to help the baby.
JULY 7– Charlie wins a third dramatic reprieve after seven international scientists hand doctors new evidence showing his chances of survival were higher than first thought.
JULY 10 – Mr Justice Francis dismisses interventions from the Pope and Trump and tells the High Court that only dramatic new evidence could save Charlie – and gives his parents 48 hours to produce it.
JULY 13 – Charlie is thrown another lifeline as an American doctor offering to treat him is invited to London by the High Court.
JULY 17 – US specialist Dr Michio Hirano flies to London and goes straight to examine Charlie, now 11 months old.
JULY 18 – Charlie’s doctors are not persuaded he should not be allowed to die after spending more than five hours with Dr Hirano and an expert from the Pope’s hospital.
JULY 21 - Miss Yates shrieks in anguish after hearing for the first time in court that her baby’s latest scan results were ‘very sad’.
JULY 23 – Miss Yates and Mr Gard, 32, release a statement condemning the death threats sent to Great Ormond Street staff. Miss Yates says: ‘Despite conflicting issues, we have always had the utmost respect for all the staff who work tirelessly at Great Ormond Street Hospital and the very difficult jobs they do every day.’
JULY 24 – Mr Justice Francis had been scheduled to analyse what Charlie’s parents said was fresh evidence at a two-day hearing in the Family Division of the High Court. But Miss Yates and Mr Gard make the shock decision to give up the fight to keep Charlie alive, saying: ‘Sleep tight our beautiful little boy.’ It is ten days before his first birthday.
The judge also laments social media for giving a platform to users ‘who know almost nothing’. He pours scorn on the ‘ absurd notion’ by online commentators that the baby had been a ‘prisoner of the NHS’.
JULY 25 – Lawyers representing Charlie’s parents and Great Ormond Street are back in court for a hearing at which the parents say they want to take him home to die.
JULY 26 – Charlie’s parents reluctantly admit he should spend his final days in a hospice but remain in dispute with Great Ormond Street over the length of time he should stay there. Great Ormond Street nurses offer to care for him in his final days. Mr Justice Francis says if the parties cannot agree before noon the next day, Charlie will be moved to a hospice and life- support treatment would end soon after.
JULY 27 – The High Court rules Charlie will be moved to a hospice and have his life support withdrawn soon afterwards. Charlie is then moved. YESTERDAY – Charlie Gard’s parents announce his death shortly after 6pm.