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In the news today it was reported that a medical ethics expert has called for doctors to be allowed to let very young premature babies die naturally.

The news brings into the headlines once again the 'right to life' and the 'right to die'.

Baroness Warnock has called for guidelines to be brought in over the resuscitation of babies born prematurely in Britain. She has urged that an age limit to be set, below which babies would not be resuscitated, providing clear guidance for doctors.

Baroness Warnock led the first government-sponsored investigation into human fertilisation in the 1980s. Its findings led to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act.

The Nuffield Council on Bioethics, a medical think tank, is conducting an inquiry into the care given to premature babies. It is considering proposing new guidelines.

In a national news report, Sir Alan Craft, president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health said that such guidelines were a legitimate option to consider. He said that with babies born under 23 weeks it was not very difficult to tell which would survive.

Currently doctors must consider resuscitating all of these babies.

Once doctors have begun assisting these babies, parents find it very difficult to agree to withdraw treatment, even if it is not helping, he said.

A study of the most premature babies showed that most went on to suffer disabilities. The EPICure study of babies born at 25 weeks or less found that by the age of six 22% of babies born at this early had a severe disability, including cerebral palsy, and 34% had milder problems. It found that only 11% of babies born at 23 weeks survive, although this figure is now believed to be closer to 20%.

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