Irish court rules clinically-dead pregnant woman can be taken off life support

LONDON — Ireland’s High Court ruled on Friday that a life support machine keeping a brain-dead woman alive could be switched off because her unborn fetus had no chance of survival, a decision likely to upset anti-abortion campaigners.

While the unusual case is unlikely to set a precedent, it has revived debate in the predominantly Catholic country about its abortion ban.

The pregnant woman, who has not been named to protect her privacy, was declared clinically dead on Dec. 3 after damaging her head in a serious fall. Doctors then refused her family’s pleas to turn off her life support machine, citing fears they could be sued for negligence or even be charged with murder for depriving her unborn fetus of life support.

The High Court ruled on Friday that the case raised issues of “great public importance” but said the 18-week fetus would not survive because of the deteriorating state of the woman’s body, meaning that continuing life support was futile.

“While the unborn child is not yet in distress, it is facing into a ‘perfect storm’ from which it has no realistic prospect of emerging alive. It has nothing but distress and death in prospect,” the court said in its ruling.

It held out the prospect however that it might rule differently in future cases if a fetus had a realistic chance of survival, stressing that the rights of an unborn child “must prevail over the feelings of grief and respect for a mother who is no longer living.”