Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Young Children

In the wake of the Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans cases, a wide-ranging international conversation was started regarding alternative thresholds for intervention and the different balances that can be made in weighing up the rights and interests of the child, the parent's rights and responsibilities and the role of medical professionals and the courts. This collection provides a comparative perspective on these issues by bringing together analysis from a range of jurisdictions across Europe, North and South America, Africa and Asia. Contextualising the differences and similarities, and drawing out the cultural and social values that inform the approach in different countries, this volume is highly valuable to scholars across jurisdictions, not only to inform their own local debate on how best to navigate such cases, but also to foster inter-jurisdictional debate on the issues. The book brings together commentators from the fields of law, medical ethics, and clinical medicine across the world, actively drawing on the view from the clinic as well as philosophical, legal and sociological perspectives on the crucial question of who should decide about the fate of a child suffering from a serious illness. In doing so, the collection offers comprehensive treatment of the key questions around whether the current best interests approach is still appropriate, and if not, what the alternatives are. It engages head-on with the concerns seen in both the academic and popular literature that there is a need to reconsider the orthodoxy in this area.

Imogen Goold is Associate Professor and Jonathan Herring is Professor, both at the Faculty of Law, University of Oxford. Cressida Auckland is Assistant Professor in the Department of Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

1. Introduction Imogen Goold, Cressida Auckland and Jonathan Herring 2. Identifying Who and What, then How: Attending to the Role of the Decision-Maker in the Normative Debate about the Best Interests Standard Rosalind McDougall 3. Parental Rights, Best Interests and Significant Harm: Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Children in Belgium Ingrid Boone 4. 'Parental Rights', 'Best Interests' and the Withdrawal of Life-Sustaining Medical Treatment of Children in Scotland: A Lack of Authority Alan Brown 5. Parental Decisions on their Children's Medical Treatment in Switzerland Andrea Büchler 6. Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Minors: The Hong Kong Context Daisy Cheung 7. Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Children in China: A Multidimensional Analysis of Parental Authoritarianism Ding Chunyan 8. Parental Rights in Mexican Law Mariana Dobernig Gago 9. Decision-Making on Behalf of Children in the Research and Clinical Context: A United States Perspective Leslie Francis, Jeff Botkin and Douglas Diekema 10. Withholding and Withdrawal of Life-Prolonging Treatment from Young Children in Israel Roy Gilbar 11. Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Children in English and Welsh Law: A Child-Centred Best Interests Approach Imogen Goold, Cressida Auckland and Jonathan Herring 12. Parental Rights, Best Interests and Significant Harms: Singapore and Malaysia Perspectives on Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Children Calvin WL Ho and Sharon Kaur 13. Decisions about their Body: Children's Rights and Parental Responsibility in Chile Fabiola Lathrop Gómez 14. Who has the Final Word? On Trust and Legal Uncertainty within the Swedish Healthcare System Pernilla Leviner 15. Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Children in Ireland Lydia Bracken and John Lombard 16. Decisionally Incapable Children and Medical Treatment Choices in Canada Constance MacIntosh 17. Offering a Reasonable Future: Withdrawal of Life-Sustaining Treatment from Infants in French Law with Illustrations from a Parisian Neonatal Resuscitation Unit Jean-Frédéric Ménard 18. Parental Responsibility and Medical Decision-Making in Southern Africa: A Comparative Analysis of South Africa and Botswana Admark Moyo 19. Young Children and Healthcare Decisions in Spain: Who Decides? Monica Navarro-Michel 20. Who Decides the Best Interests of the Child in the End-of-Life Process? A Look at the Peruvian and Argentine Reality Paula Siverino Bavio 21. Reviewing Medical Decisions Concerning Infants within the Norwegian Healthcare System: A Public Law Approach Karl Harald Sovig 22. Children and Medical Decision-Making in Australia Post-Gard: A Possible Reformulation Cameron Stewart 23. Parental Authoritarianism and Medical Decision-Making in Thailand: The Need to Limit Parental Authority Thitinant Tengaumnuay 24. Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Critically Ill Minors in Greece Theodoros Trokanas 25. Making Decisions for Children in Healthcare and Medical Research: African Communal Responsibility or Individual Rights? Samuel J Ujewe 26. The Relevance of Cultural Competence to Resolving Disputes in Relation to Medical Decisions for Children Ben Gray 27. Legal and Cultural Differences in Medical Decision-Making on Behalf of Very Young Children Imogen Goold and Cressida Auckland