Churches Welcome Nuffield Report on Disabled Newborns

The Church of England and the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales have welcomed the report of the Nuffield Council on the treatment of extremely disabled or premature newborns.

Nuffield's report on the 'Critical care decisions in fetal and neonatal medicine: Ethical issues', published today, recommended that babies born before or at 22 weeks should not be routinely resuscitated or receive intensive care.

The report was drawn up by the Nuffield Council in response to the increasing number of extremely premature babies being born in the UK. It said it was "extremely rare" for babies born before 22 weeks to survive as only around 1 per cent of babies born at this age survive to leave hospital.

Professor Margaret Brazier, who led the committee that produced the guidelines, said: "Natural instincts are to try to save all babies, even if the baby's chances of survival are low. However, we don't think it is always right to put a baby through the stress and pain of invasive treatment if the baby is unlikely to get any better and death is inevitable."

The Rt Rev Tom Butler, Bishop of Southwark, and the Most Rev Peter Smith, Catholic Archbishop of Cardiff, released a joint statement today on behalf of the Church of England House of Bishops and the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales.

In the statement, the two church leaders welcomed Nuffield Council's recommendation that "the active ending of life of newborn babies should not be allowed, no matter how serious their condition," which they said reaffirmed the validity of existing laws prohibiting euthanasia.

The Bishop of Southwark became embroiled in a row this week over his submission to the Nuffield Council consultation, prior to the release of the report, in which he said that it was sometimes right to withdraw medical treatment in certain cases.

In today's joint statement, Bishop Butler and Archbishop Smith said that the Nuffield Council report upheld the vital and fundamental moral principle that the deliberate taking of innocent human life is always gravely wrong.

"There is a clear distinction between interventions which are deliberately aimed at killing, and decisions to withhold or withdraw medical treatment when it is judged to be futile or unduly burdensome."

In 2004, Bishop Butler and Archbishop Smith wrote in a joint submission to the Select Committee of the Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill that "doctors do not have an overriding obligation to prolong life by all available means".

They said that treatment could in certain cases be withheld or withdrawn but stressed that such decisions had to follow the principle that "a pattern of care should never be adopted with the intention, purpose or aim of terminating the life or bringing about the death of a patient".

In today's statement, the Bishop of Southwark and the Archbishop of Cardiff recommended a case by case approach, stressing that treatment should "always be made on an individual basis having regard to all the circumstances of the case".

They concluded: "We will wish to study the detail of the Nuffield Council's report but welcome the extremely important recommendation opposing any action aimed at the active ending of life of newborn babies."