The legal, political and conflicting principles battle that took place over his head – between the United Kingdom and Italy – is over, for Then Gregory begins the last journey of an existence that was however too short. To put a firm point on the fate of the 8-month-old English girl, suffering from a very serious mitochondrial pathology, decreed as terminal by the doctors of the Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham and by the British judges, yesterday was the separation from the main vital devices, announced several times and postponed. Detachment finally carried out under police escort in a local hospice, as imposed by the courts of the Kingdom on the family, starting from the interruption of assisted ventilation and the connection to alternative instruments which should guarantee the little girl not to suffer, while they will be administered the pharmaceutical palliatives responsible for accompanying her “gradually” towards death. In the name of an epilogue now written, despite the heartbreaking opposition of her parents, Dean Gregory and Claire Staniforth, and justified by togas and white coats from across the Channel as the least as cruel and painful as possible, however tragic, to be adopted “in the best interests” of the unfortunate baby. An epilogue which remains suspended until – hours or days, no one knows – Indi’s heart stops beating and her little body prostrates from the illness he will completely succumb (for Alfie Evans, at the center of an almost identical affair that took place in 2018, it took 5 whole days.) And that does not erase controversies, doubts of conscience, cross-recriminations between the peninsula and the island. On the Italian front, those left to make themselves heard are the activists who have supported and strenuously promoted the family’s battle – together with a team of lawyers and English Christian pro-life associations – in favor of an extension of assistance and then the option of transfer Baby Jesus was made available a couple of weeks ago by the Roman pediatric hospital as in other similar previous situations.
But also members of Giorgia Meloni’s majority, who have personally committed themselves in recent days to ensuring the rapid granting of Italian citizenship to Indi (as done in vain 5 years ago also for Alfie by Paolo Gentiloni’s team) and then attempting a whole series of subsequent steps. Until the unprecedented appeal to the Justice Minister of Rishi Sunak’s Tory government, Alex Chalk, to “raise awareness” of the judiciary to try to induce it to cede jurisdiction over the dossier to Italy, on the basis of a broad interpretation of the Convention of The Hague of ’96 on the subject of international judicial cooperation. An interpretation that the three judges of the London Court of Appeal, protagonists yesterday of the last resort verdict, rejected in peremptory tones. On the one hand, liquidating “the tactic legal” by the Gregorys as the result of “manipulation” by the activists; on the other, denouncing – in the position of judge rapporteur Peter Jackson – “the intervention of the Italian authorities” as “a total misunderstanding of the spirit of the Hague Convention”. And in any case endorsing “the strong evidence” in support of the prognosis of the Nottingham doctors, linked to a now definitive absence of “interactions” on Indi’s part and to the signs of his “significant suffering” caused by the “invasive” treatments . Words that the little girl’s parents continued to contest to the end, saying they were “disgusted” and branding yesterday’s no to their last resort as “a final kick in the teeth”. And that according to Jacopo Coghe, of Pro Vita & Non-profit family, would in reality hide “totally euthanasia parameters on the dignity of life”. Pope Francis, for his part, has chosen to offer in these hours “closeness and prayers to Indi, to her mother and to her father”. While Beppino Englaro, who for 17 years, starting in 1992, led a battle to have the right to decide on the suspension of treatment for his daughter Eluana recognized as a father, noted how the dilemma over who should have the last word on the end of life , between families and authorities, remains crucial, in one sense as in the other: and it should be clarified on a global level “once and for all and for everyone”, if only it were not “pure utopia”.
Breathe with the mask
Then Gregory «for the moment she has survived extubation and is breathing with a mask. The protocol provides for the supply of oxygen to be for a fixed period of time. It also provides for the suspension of treatment and a ban on resuscitation in the event of a crisis. We are following with apprehension.” Lawyer Simone Pillon, from the Gregory family’s legal team, stated this in a tweet.