A little baby boy at the center of adult drama.

Charlie Gard, a baby boy, just 11 months old, is at the center of an international drama, involving his parents, the Pope, President Donald Trump, the US Congress, the Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) and various British Courts. Little Charlie suffers from, what is known as, Encephalomyopathic Mitochondrial DNA Depletion Syndrome, a genetic disorder. Seems that, normally the mitochondria in a sperm breaks down at the time it fertilises an ovum so that only maternal mitochondria is passed down to babies. Why Charlie's mitochondria is depleting is not known, but since mitochondrial DNA has to be present in every cell his muscles and brain have suffered extensive damage. Nucleoside therapy is highly experimental and has never been tried in anyone with Charlie's condition, so the doctors at GOSH did not use it on him, presumably for fear of killing him. Doctors must function according to the principle of 'Do No Harm', which is part of their training. The doctors at GOSH appealed to the courts to switch off Charlie's life support systems, which was granted. However, Charlie's parents refused to give up and appealed first to the Court of Appeal and then to the Supreme Court, losing both times. At this point the case became a public drama. A US doctor claimed that nucleoside therapy may help Charlie, the Pope and Trump made statements of support and now the US Congress has offered permanent residency to Charlie. Meanwhile, a sympathetic public has contributed 1.3 million pounds to a fund set up for Charlie's treatment. Though extremely sad the whole case has become a bit of a farce. Why are British doctors and courts refusing to transfer Charlie to the US? There is enough money to transfer him by air ambulance with full life support. Once Charlie is out of the hospital their responsibility ends. We understand that parents love their son and are unwilling to accept his death but it is impossible to understand why they want to keep him alive in a vegetative state. Since mitochondria is inherited from the mother it is possible that Charlie's mother feels guilty about his condition and is stubbornly insisting on keeping him alive in the hope that some treatment maybe invented which will cure him. The boy who inspired the film 'Lorenzo's Oil' lived for 22 years. But to what end? At least he was able to breathe on his own, which Charlie is unable to do, which means he will need 24 hour intensive care. How long can that be sustained? As for politicians, they have no business meddling into something they do not understand and those that are using this unfortunate boy for publicity should be ashamed of themselves. For little Charlie's sake, courts in Britain should allow him to be transferred, doctors in the US should not experiment on him and his parents should accept that science cannot control nature. Our abilities are finite.