Charlie Gard’s parents have been given a little more time with their son after a court ruled the hospital was allowed to turn off the terminally ill baby's life support and allow him to die.
The 10-month-old has a rare genetic disease and brain damage — he is one of only 16 known to have mitochondrial depletion syndrome.
Charlie’s parents had been fighting in the British courts to be allowed to take him to the U.S. for an experimental treatment, but the courts ruled not to allow them to do so because doctors didn’t feel it would be beneficial.
Connie Yates and Chris Gard lost their final appeal Tuesday and hospital personnel had planned to turn off life support Friday, but made an announcement they had decided to give the parents more time with him before doing it.
“Together with Charlie’s parents we are putting plans in place for his care and to give them more time together as a family,” Great Ormond Street Hopsital said in a statement, asking that the family be given “space and privacy at this distressing time,” The Associated Press reported.
It wasn’t clear how much more time the family would have before life support is turned off.
"We’re not allowed to choose if our son lives and we’re not allowed to choose when or where Charlie dies," father Chris Gard said in a video, according to the AP. The parents had wanted to bring their son home to die, but were told they couldn’t do so.
Charlie's parents raised 1.3 million British pounds to pay for the U.S. treatment, but were still told they couldn’t make use of it.
Twitter users decried in strong terms the British single-payer health care system that wouldn’t allow the parents to let their son get treatment.
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