A UK judge has authorized doctors to perform a cesarean section on a 16-year-old teenager with a «history of sexual abuse» and post-traumatic stress disorder despite the fact that the minor, a ward of social services, wanted only to give birth by natural childbirth.
The Court of Protection has determined that surgical intervention was the only «realistic» option, as medical work to induce labor had failed and the minor had changed her mind on several occasions. Failure to act, the hospital’s lawyers argued, implied a «significant risk of fetal death,» according to the BBC.
The ruling, issued last Friday, had remained under wraps until after the baby’s birth. Lawyers representing the hospital confirmed the birth on Monday, although they did not clarify whether a cesarean section was finally performed, as the judge had authorized.
