To post a message about a missing child

[alreadytaken]

A five-year-old boy with a brain tumour has been taken without consent from hospital by his parents, sparking a major police hunt for the family.

Ashya King was taken from Southampton General Hospital and is now believed to be in France with his parents and six siblings.

Police said he needs constant medical care and there are "serious concerns" for his life if he is not found today.

The family, from Southsea, Portsmouth, were travelling in a grey coloured Hyundai I800 Style CRDI, registration KP60 HWK.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-28978655

The family are reported to be Jehovah's Witnesses, who may have religious objections to some medical treatments.

Maybe they are trying to find doctors who can perform treatment allowed by JWs. However, even if allowed in some other countries, these limitations might make treatment less effective.

In such cases, the legal process needs to become involved, to balance ECHR guarantee to religious freedom with the medical needs of a minor.

Unless there is a court order the parents have not taken the child without consent. Against medical advice, maybe. But not without consent.

The article does not state if a court order has been made.

I agree that people don't know the backstory of all this. On the face of it you'd think why would people do something like that. But I think there's more to it.

The doctors can go to court to over rule the parents if they feel it's in the child's best interest.

Oh right thanks for clearing that up I did wonder if a court order was in place I just think its bloody tragic that he could die in somehouse in France in terrible pain

As this news report states he's been take without consent it sounds like there is a court order in place. I just hope he's not too scared or in too much pain.

The feeding tube is battery-operated and the battery will run out today. His condition will be deteriorating rapidly all the time he is out of hospital. I must say it is very difficult to fathom what the parents are thinking. Most parents would want their seriously ill child, who has just had an operation and cannot talk or walk, to be in hospital. Very very worrying and puzzling indeed.

"Most parents would want their seriously ill child, who has just had an operation and cannot talk or walk, to be in hospital. "

that might depend on what else staff are wanting to do & his prognosis.

i do think that putting him through the journey seems odd though.

The operation was last month rather than the last few days and he was said to be improving slowly. No suggestions it was terminal. It does seem a strange thing to do at this point.

Holy I get your point, but I don't think its on to round on OP who I imagine was simply trying to highlight the police's appeal in case anyone can help.

The OP certainly didn't seem to be criticizing the parents for their actions.

Flossy: your aunt was 72 and if she wishes to refuse medical treatment, she is in a far better position to do so than this child.

He is very ill and is now in the hands of two medically unqualified people who may not be in their right mind -whether that is a state reached by worry, anguish, ignorance, stupidity or cruelty: frankly, who cares!

The end result is the same: a little boy, in pain, being dragged on a long journey by two people who have no training and no access to drugs for their own, ultimately selfish reasons.

As to walking in their shoes....no...I prefer to think what it is like to be in that child's shoes right now. They have no right which allows them to play with this child's right and it is very worrying if their rights as parents are being trotted out.

This defence would not be put forward in a child abuse case and nor should it be here.

The sooner they are apprehended the better.

All the reports I've read quote the words "without consent".
If there was a legal order actually in place at the time, it would be clearer to issue a statement that the parents took the child "in breach of a legal / care order". It might motivate people more to report, rather than wondering about parental rights.

Or had the order not been applied for / approved before they left ?

Strong religious views, whether Jehovah's Witness like these parents, or any other, can motivate intelligent people to do things the rest of us find incomprehensible.

We do not have all the facts and therefore cannot judge

Being and paediatric nurse having watching my beautiful boy 13 die a slow death and watch him deteriorate I really wish I had had the courage of the parents.

That wasn't my point chop my point was that she is dying and would rather be around her family than in a hospital surrounded by strangers and as her family who care for her we agree.

As I said I will not judge this family based on the limited information available at the moment. I would not dare to assume I know what losing a child does to a parent or how their thought process works during such a distressing time.

There are far too few facts in this case to make a judgement.

My sympathies lie with the parents and family, it must be a terribly difficult time.

Perhaps the little boy was desperate to meet Mickey Mouse so the parents in a moment of madness decided to just do it, perhaps they were sick of being couped up in hopsital, there are a million and one reasons which could explain why the parents did it. Wrong of course but I just can't bring myself to judge them too much.

Given he has has major surgery already then I do wonder if their beliefs are relevant that much. Surely (and perhaps someone medical can confirm) it would be highly unlikely to have had major brain surgery without requiring some sort of blood product during the process?

jacks365 "The operation was last month rather than the last few days"

It was 7 days ago. That's not 'last month'.

There has got to be more to this story.

Is there a possibility the court order was instigated previously to allow medical procedures which the parents were refusing to consent to?

I feel for the parents, but I feel more for the poorly little boy who’s just had a major operation, doesn’t have access to pain meds and whose feeding tube is about to run out of battery.

Grunt it would appear that there has been more than one operation and the report I was reading focused on the one done in July. You are of course right and there was another operation done last week. He has however been in hospital all this time so it does beg the question why now?

Sirzy: there are cell salvage machines that can be used, which save up all the blood you lose, clean it up, and pump it back in, so you don't need blood products. No idea whether this was used here though.

If he has an incurable brain tumour maybe they would like to spent the last weeks of his life as a family.

Not the last weeks. When the battery on his feeding pump runs out - and that is likely to be today - he would die quite quickly of thirst and starvation.

my first reacion when I heard the news was that it was his family and if he was dying they had the right to take him away to die. But as has been pointed out that is possibly depriving him of necessary pain relief. So it was an attempt to highlight the police appeal so that the family can hopefully be found and the child given any treatment he neds. I don't think parents have the right to deprive a child of treatment.