Against euthanasia, SC ensures govt medical care for man

Supreme Court of India. File pic

The Supreme Court has come to the help of the distraught parents of a 30-year-old man, who has been in a permanent vegetative state for over 11 years following a severe head injury, by ensuring government-supported medical care and assistance for him.

The parents, who had slipped into poverty due to the expenses being incurred during the prolonged treatment and care of their son Harish Rana and were unable to sustain it any more, had moved the top court against a Delhi High Court order refusing them a nod for passive euthanasia for their son.

In an order passed on his last working day, Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud perused a report of the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and approved its plan to provide medical and other care to the bed-ridden Rana.

Justice Chandrachud-led bench had said it was not the case of passive euthanasia as he was not on a ventilator or other mechanical support to sustain life and rather, was being fed through a food pipe. Instead of allowing passive euthanasia, which is not permissible in this case, it would explore the possibility of shifting him to a government hospital or a similar place for treatment and care, it had said.

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