It is impossible to meet Rome's
request to move 10-month-old terminally ill Charlie Gard to the
Bambino Gesù Hospital, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson told
Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano Wednesday.
Over the phone, Alfano raised the case and reiterated the
Vatican kids' hospital's offer, the foreign ministry said.
Johnson expressed gratitude and appreciation for the Italian
offer but explained that legal reasons prevent Britain from
meeting it.
Rare-disease specialists at Vatican-owned Rome children's
hospital Bambino Gesù are working with other international
experts to map out an experimental treatment protocol for
Charlie, hospital chief Mariella Enoc said.
She said the team was also in touch with US experts.
Charlie's mother Connie Yates spoke this morning with the
Rome hospital doctors.
Enoc said London's Great Ormond Street Hospital would agree
to a transfer if the Bambino Gesù agreed to implement a British
supreme court ruling that Charlie should be taken off life
support, but the Rome hospital was unwilling to do this.
Yates on Tuesday phoned the Bambino Gesu' and was "very
determined" to see if there was a chance of treating the boy,
Enoc said - but Great Ormond Street said it could not move the
boy from London to Rome for legal reasons.
Enoc said this was "sad" but "our doctors and scientists are
still looking into the possibility".
Enoc said Yates "appears set to stop at nothing" after a
British court ordered her son's treatment to be
stopped.
The Bambino Gesu' offered to help Yates and her husband Chris
Gard after Pope Francis said treatment should be provided "until
the end".
Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin on Tuesday
said the pope had "full confidence" in the Bambino Gesu'
management.
Health Minister Beatrice Lorenzin said at the presentation of
the hospital's annual report Tuesday that its "willingness to
welcome Charlie is a mark of your vocation and what you are.
It's certainly good news for those parents".
US President Donald Trump has also offered to help and on
Tuesday the Sun reported an unnamed US hospital was ready to
treat him free of charge despite UK and European court's rulings
against useless treatment.
British Prime Minister Theresa May said that Great Ormond
Street will "always consider any offers on new information"
about his welfare.
Charlie's parents want Charlie, who has a form of
mitochondrial disease, a genetic condition that causes
progressive muscle weakness and brain damage, to have treatment
in the US.
But the hospital's doctors said that, given Charlie's
condition, the therapy was unlikely to have a beneficial
outcome.
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