A critically ill baby at the centre of a legal battle over end-of-life care has died. Indi Gregory from Ilkeston, who had mitochondrial disease was transferred to a hospice on Saturday.
Doctors at the Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham were given permission to withdraw treatment after arguing that there was nothing more they could do for the eight month old.
She was transferred to a hospice on Saturday after a ruling by Court of Appeal judges was made on Friday that her parents could not take her home and life support to be removed for her to die there. In the hospice, her life support was turned off and she died in her mother's arms at 1:45am on Monday.
Her father Dean Gregory said that Indi's mother, Claire Staniforth held her for her final breaths, but that they had both been left "angry, heartbroken and ashamed". He said that the NHS and the courts had not only taken away her chance to live longer but that they had also taken away Indi's dignity to pass away in the family home where she belonged.
Her parents have lost a number of court appeals in recent weeks and months trying to persuade judges to give their daughter more time. The family had tried to convince the High Court, the Court of Appeal and the European Court of Human Rights judges that she should continue to receive care.
However, specialists said that Indi was dying and that the treatment she was receiving was causing pain and was futile. Her parents completely disagreed and had tried to transfer Indi to a hospital in Rome, Italy, but this also failed with the media reporting in some areas that the legal system was challenging that officials in the country were misusing the 1996 Hague Convention in trying to arrange it.