Outrageous: UK Hospital Didn't Feed Alfie for 28 Hours After Pulling His Life Support
“Not even an animal would be treated like this.”
Those were the impassioned words of U.K. resident Tom Evans, a man who has been battling the socialist medical establishment of Great Britain to save the life of his son, Alfie, the 23-month-old who was taken off life support Monday night at Liverpool’s Alder Hey Children’s Hospital.
And according to LifeNews and the Catholic News World, hospital officials were not making it easy for the boy to live.
In the latest twist of the long-running case that has raised pro-life passions on both sides of the Atlantic, and has drawn the intervention of Pope Francis, Evans charged that hospital official wouldn’t even provide the boy nutrition.
He said they didn’t start feeding the boy until 28 hours after they pulled life support.
“It’s disgusting how he’s being treated,” Evans told the British television show “This Morning,” on Wednesday, according to the U.K. Mirror.
“Not even an animal would be treated like this. He’s proving them wrong. It’s time to give him some grace and dignity and let him go home or to Italy.”
Bambino Gesu hospital in Rome has offered to take the boy in an attempt to treat the illness — a suspected neurological disease — that’s afflicted him since he was taken to Alder Hey in December 2016.
However, British medical authorities have determined the toddler has no chance of survival and have refused to allow his parents to take him on the grounds that the flight could trigger “continuous seizures due to stimulations,” according to LifeNews.
Evans told reporters outside Alder Hey on Tuesday that the family is going to keep fighting.
“The court of appeal have reached out to us and said they are going to set back three judges to hear the case,” he said, according to the U.K Sun.
“In reality, he could be in Italy right now. We all know the military air force are ready to take him and a team of doctors are there. We’ve also got a German air ambulance team, who attempted to take him in the first place, ready.”
He’s also kept supporters up to date through social media, like the Alfie’s Army page on Facebook, and through supporters who’ve helped spread the news on Twitter.
The Evans boy’s case isn’t the first to pit an anguished family against a British medical establishment that has determined a child is apparently unfit to live.
Last year, the critically ill British toddler Charlie Gard was also allowed to die, despite efforts from world leaders including the pope and President Donald Trump, who also offered to help as much as possible.
Clearly, for all that liberals like to tout the benefits of socialized medicine, saving the lives of critically ill young boys is not a strongpoint of Britain’s National Health Service.
But to deny the life-sustaining element of nutrition, granting a 23-month-old only water and oxygen for critical hours after removing him from life support, is a step almost too horrible for a normal mind to contemplate.
“Not even an animal would be treated like this,” Evans told his interviewers.
And he was dead right. Let’s hope Alfie proves how wrong they are.
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