Pope: Dying boy’s parents should ‘treat him to the end’

POPE FRANCIS has called for the parents of terminally-ill Charlie Gard to be allowed to “accompany and treat their child until the end”.

Chris Gard and Connie Yates are spending the last days of their 10-month-old son’s life with him, after being given more time before his lifesupport is turned off. The Vatican press office said the Pope “is following with affection and sadness the case of little Charlie Gard and expresses his closeness to his parents”.

It added: “For this he prays that their wish to accompany and treat their child until the end is not neglected”.

Charlie, who suffers from a rare genetic condition and has brain damage, is being cared for at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH). He has been at the centre of a lengthy legal battle between his parents, who wanted him to undergo a therapy trial in the United States, and specialists at the hospital who said the treatment was experimental and would not help.

The couple, from Bedfont, west London, released a video on Thursday saying they had been told Charlie would die the next day. They said they had been denied their final wish to be able to take their son home to die.

The hospital later confirmed it was “putting plans in place for his care”.

Charlie’s parents asked European court judges in Strasbourg to consider their case after judges in the High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court in London ruled in favour of GOSH doctors. But last Tuesday the European Court of Human Rights refused to intervene.