Archie Battersbee case

[whynotwhatknot]

I was just wondering why we're not allowed to post about this case-the deletion message mentioned it was ongoing so wouldnt be fair to the family

Charlie gards case was on going and there was numerous threads about it

Anyway if this stands maybe we can discuss

thank you lilymumsnet. glad to see you decided to re-instate the thread

@Jott Well it's been very ambiguous over what happened to him, happily reporting on this TikTok trend no one could name, and no one seems to mention the previous media appearances.

I'm just shocked at the other side to this story that seems to exist. I'm fairly local to the area (Southend hospital is my nearest hospital), and it seems locally there is a different opinion.

Oh that other side of the story.

Yes, I think there is much to be said there and possibly a discussion to be had however I don't think it is a discussion that could take place here without getting the thread pulled for breaking talk guidelines.

There are places elsewhere online where I'm sure it can be discussed.

There will surely be other discussions taking please, yes. There was a section on the news earlier - BBC I think - which threw up a completely different scenario than the one that has been told so far.

@Jott @BootsAndRoots I am interested in the past press appearances if someone could pm me please, I haven't found anything by googling.

@Jott and @BootsAndRoots Oh me too please! I haven't read anything about that

Would you have a link to that? Sorry if it's obvious, but I haven't seen this on the BBC

Not sure if you need a fb account to view this or not

fb.watch/dYD2ywkKS2/

It honestly is very heartbreaking, I definitely couldn’t imagine what the family are feeling. I’m not in the UK so have only recently seen this piece of news.

It’s a very difficult decision to withdraw life support. On one hand you have medical experts giving low hope of recovery (but not zero hope) and you don’t want to prolong the child’s suffering. But on the other hand, there have been several incidents (and recent incidents too, within the last 3 years) where people have been declared brain stem dead with further deterioration, who have then woken up by some miracle and they’ve fully recovered with a good quality of life.

Zack Dunlap was being prepared for organ donation, he woke up.
Trent McKinley (I think was his name), was again ready to be prepared for organ donation when he woke up.
Lewis Roberts, a couple of years ago, again being prepped for donations, woke up.
Scott Marr - his family told there was no hope of life, again he came round. These are people who have woken up and lived. Lived a decent quality life, not ‘living’ in vegetive states.

There have been people who’ve been in comas for years (like 20 plus), who have been declared scientifically dead with no hope of survival, who have regained consciousness and some of which have gone on to live relatively or completely normal lives.

So that’s what makes it so so difficult. I’m not sure what I would do so I definitely can’t sit at home and judge a parent for believing in hope. Doctors, scientists and judges do sometimes make bad calls. They’re not always right. Of course, the majority of the time they are, but gosh, so hard. For everyone.

@Aussiegirl123456, as I understand it the medics in this case are giving zero hope, and that's from quite a range of second opinions.

There aren't people whose brains are decomposing and partially dropping into their spines who've regained consciousness and gone on to live normal lives, though. Which would be the appropriate comparison.

The one saving grace is that Archie is at least beyond the ability to feel pain.

@CosmopolitanPlease have a look at the Dignity for All Facebook page. It has the press appearances on one of their posts from a couple of weeks ago.

I’ve heard a lot of people talk about this site but when I type Dignity for All into my search engine, the only results I get are for LGBQT articles 🤷‍♀️

I have just watched it - that’s completely different, isn’t it? The whole history of the event is different.

Also, the reporting is that the judges agreed that there was grounds for appeal on the “best interests” basis.

I don’t understand how Wednesday’s appeal was supposed to be on the validity of imaging/blood flow studies for brain death but that wasn’t actually addressed and Archie’s team argued “best interests” instead?

If you click the link I posted earlier this morning, that will take you to their page.

To make sense of that you have to differentiate between 'Archie's team' and his parents' team. The barrister doing the arguing for best interests was the latter. Archie's team (the lady barrister) was in broad agreement with the health trust's team. The parents' QC was (unfortunately in my opinion) able to find some wiggle room to change the direction of the whole thing. The end result when it gets to court again will most likely be the same in that treatment will be withdrawn but poor Archie's body will have spent another fortnight being basically dead in a bed, which feels very wrong, again in my opinion.

The parents' QC was (unfortunately in my opinion) able to find some wiggle room to change the direction of the whole thing

Im showing my legal naivety but I thought when an appeal was to be heard on the basis of a particular point, or points, that was what needed to be addressed.

Does that mean if they have the best interest case there could be another segue?

Will the brain stem death diagnosis issue have to be picked up again, or was that the “in” the parents’ team wanted so they could discuss best interests?

Im uncomfortable with “best interests”, especially given what the Christian legal group had to say when waiting for the High Court verdict

Andrea Williams is the Chief Executive of the Christian Legal Centre. Before the High Court case she said this:

There is no clear definition of death in English law, and a case like this has never come before an English court before

The outcome is crucial for Archie and his family and anyone who cares about the value of life in this country

this statement is why “best interests” argument make me uneasy.

I thought so too but it seems not! The judges mentioned 'turning the clock back' which makes a kind of sense I suppose. It seems that Judge Arbuthnott did err in law by 'parking' the best interests side of things in favour of the brain stem test route. We will know more when yesterday's judges give their written reasons.

It seems that Judge Arbuthnott did err in law by 'parking' the best interests side of things in favour of the brain stem test route

I feel a bit bad for her, even though I know it’s all just legal wrangling, because she DID address it. She addressed the conversation he’d had with his brother, where he reportedly said he would want to stay on a ventilator and also where she addressed the family’s religion which had strengthened during the hospital process. She also addressed Archie’s precarious fluid balance issues, and the burden of the physical issues on his body, even though he wasn’t aware.

i suppose the brain stem challenge wouldn’t have made it very far, so lawyers were hoping for another opening.

While it’s true that all of the conventional brain stem tests couldn’t t be performed on Archie because of lack of peripheral nerve response (too dead), it’d be pretty hard to find a medical expert who would support any ambiguity around the diagnosis.

Lack of blood supply to the brain for two months and having parts of the brain dropping to the lumbar spine don’t give any diagnostic wriggle room.

Is it just lawyers being tricky and succeeding?

When you apply for permission to appeal, if you are refused permission by the original court you can apply again to the higher court. The same applies if you are given permission on some grounds but not others - you can ask the higher court to give you permission on the refused grounds. I assume that is what happened in this case. Right at the beginning, the judges said they had given permission on five more grounds, but in the event made it pretty clear that the one they wanted to hear argument on was the best interests one.

but in the event made it pretty clear that the one they wanted to hear argument on was the best interests one

Does that mean that once “best interests” has been addressed, they can go back to other points?

i don’t think the court can go back to the declaration of death because the court of appeal seems to be saying that if the doctors were unwilling to declare Archie dead in line with the code of practice (?), it is inappropriate for the court to make a declaration he is dead where doctors will not.

thanks for the reistatement

i dont get this best interests argument-how is it in archies best interest to lie there decyaing like that

hollie stood outside the court saying she was disgusted with doctors that wanted to turn his machines off and the court are listening to her about him now

she didnt even mention his religion

hollie stood outside the court saying she was disgusted with doctors that wanted to turn his machines off and the court are listening to her about him now

I think she's deceiving herself - likewise in the bit I saw where she was saying the judges were much more empathetic. If you look at the wording of Judge Arbuthnot's judgments, she said much more that was empathetic than any of the Appeal Court judges did. Likewise it's not that they're listening to her about turning the machines off, the reasoning seems to be that in any end of life case they have to be meticulous about getting the legal procedures right, hence the court needs to give proper consideration to the best interests argument and they weren't satisfied that it had. Essentially the reasoning was legalistic, nothing to do with listening to Hollie.

Ultimately at the new hearing the judge will have to be listen very carefully to the hospital, the guardian and the parents all of whom will have every opportunity to enter full arguments, and he will then have to produce a judgment that deals with all those arguments. Even then, it if goes against Hollie I fear she will be appealing again anyway, so I'm not too optimistic that the hearing on the 11th will see the end of this.