Little boy has been removed from hospital by his parents

[Itsfab]

He is very sick, needs constant treatment. His parents have taken him to France.

I don't understand why the hospital didn't notice or alert the police for 6 hours.

The police won't comment on the parents being Jehovah's Witnesses.

It sounds wrong when the statement said he was removed without consent. The child is theirs, should be allowed to be in charge of him, but of course it is he that will lose his life if not cared for and that isn't in his best interests necessarily.

I hope he is found and can be cured.

They would have been able to turn to the elders in the JW community.

The elders would be supportive but in no way support them fleeing with their children.

Tis a very sad worrying story.

The initial media reporting was very matter of fact and said he needed to be returned to hospital. It seemed clear that the hospital think he's in danger of his illness getting worse while in the care of his parents.

It isn't necessarily about them being JW as they haven't mentioned it.

They should return him because the hospital said so. Any discussion about further treatment or not needs to happen there when all professionals and parents decide.

Dr's don't know everything, and are humans capable of making mistakes.

I am amazed at the level of control the state has over children.

There may be more to this than a battery on a feeding device, for a child who can swallow liquid food himself.

Having seen great medical advances in my condition in the past few years show up Dr's being very wrong about things, and the mistakes they made, I don't hold Dr's in great esteem anymore. Maybe these parents lost faith in the Dr's, and due to them being well aware of Dr's ability to gain court orders fecked off and gave their dying child a lovely final few days.

It's desperately sad

I too can't stop thinking about this little 5 year old little boys, his parents and his siblings.

Who has the best interests/ultimate descion of the little boy's fate...the doctors or parents?

We don't know the full facts just the media spin.

I doubt they are lying, what they are not saying is that they will report any of the sisters taking in the family . I also bet that Dad took the boy to Costa before they left the hospital too.

I'm amazed that it's taking so long to find a family of nine who are in a car with known reg plates. With a seriously ill child in a wheel-chair, they can hardly travel incognito.

"Who has the best interests/ultimate descion of the little boy's fate...the doctors or parents? "

If the family disagreed with the care he was getting, there are legitimate routes to object that do not involve depriving him of medical care all together.

"So why is this an international police operation?"

Because they want the boy located, because they are concerned about his well-being. Right now, no-one knows what level of care the parents can provide (in terms of availability and correct temperature storage of drugs and feed). The last (and less reported) bit of yesterday's hospital statement said they had detailed notes on his care so far ready to email to any hospital he was taken to about his care so far.

Whether his future care is therapeutic or palliative, the authorities will want to know about his well-being.

I think it's right that hospitals (and police where necessary) do check what happens to vulnerable patients who just walk out of a hospital.

I think it'd wrong that this is headline news.

My sympathy goes out to the boy and his family.

I don't think it is wrong that it's headline news. This little kid is not just a missing person, he also has a life-threatening medical condition with various time-constraints e.g. the battery on his feeding pack must have run out by now. If you want to find someone in a hurry, you have to go public and make a big splash about it. If he's found dead somewhere at the end of all this and there had been no urgent efforts to find him the hospital and police would be quite rightly hung out to dry.

This really shows the overweening power of the state and how any of us could have our children taken from us at any moment. That's the story. The parents have broken no laws yet the police are after them internationally. If the hospital and parents all agree the child is dying then I don't see it is any business of the state why or how the death is achieved. They should keep out of it.

What is 'juicy' about this story the religion aspect/being abroad aspect?

I think the "juicy" bit is the religious aspect.

And just out of interest. The media keep mentioning the food battery running out. Won't the parents have thought of this and have some spares? Surely if they've been looking after him for a while, they will be aware of what they need?

Radio 4 news report ended oddly earlier. Something like 'Of course the parents haven't broken any law, but the boy remains missing.'

Well define missing.

Some parents have taken their child somewhere in breach of nothing. They know where he is. Who else, legally should know?

If there is a dispute over treatment, why has a legal ruling not been sought by the hospital?

All seems a bit cart-before-horseish to have police hunts and media appeals w/o a legal case.

This little kid is not just a missing person, he also has a life-threatening medical condition with various time-constraints e.g. the battery on his feeding pack must have run out by now.

There was a hell of a time lag before they came up with these incredibly urgent details Cog

(something like 12, 15 hours?)

I also thought the reports about the feeding tube where manipulative- made to cause negatively towards the family.

News value for this story is urgency/mystery/drama/tragic nature/ involving a child.

MrsDV, the police want the media to cover the story, presumably so the child's welfare can be established. No idea why the other case you are talking about wasn't covered, there could be lots of good reasons.

It's clearly desperately sad whatever the parents' reasons and wherever they are. Whether he'd stayed on the ward or not this was very unlikely to end happily.

Not only manipulative. Possibly also arse-covering ("someone tell me why we made this media appeal? what's the danger exactly? what do our lawyers say?")