British baby’s parents abandon legal fight to get treatment in US

LONDON — Quiet sobs reverberated in a London courtroom yesterday as the parents of the terminally ill baby Charlie Gard told a judge that they had decided to let their “sweet, gorgeous and innocent” boy go and were withdrawing a bid to bring him to the United States for experimental treatment.

Charlie’s mother, Connie Yates, said the window had closed on their chance to use therapy to help their child.

“We only wanted to give him a chance at life,” Yates said, fighting back tears of her own as the boy’s father, Chris Gard, stood close behind her. “There’s now no way back for Charlie. Time has been wasted. It’s now time that has suddenly gone against him.”

The parents’ decision ends months of intense and emotional legal battles that drew the attention of President Trump and Pope Francis. The 11-monthold boy, who suffers from a rare genetic condition that has left him brain-damaged and unable to move or breathe on his own, will now be taken off a ventilator and receive palliative care only.

The London hospital that has had control of Charlie’s care since October, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, has said that further treatment would be futile and might cause the baby additional suffering.

The hospital obtained a court order in April allowing doctors to withdraw life support so Charlie could “die with dignity.” Britain’s Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom agreed with the decision, and the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, declined to take up the case last month.