A Texas mother is challenging doctors who insist her 16-month-old boy be taken off life support, LifeNews reported.
Doctors at Brackenridge Children’s Hospital have told Catarina Gonzales that medical care for her son Emilio is “futile.” He has Leigh’s disease, which destroys the central nervous system and kills most of its victims by age 7.
Under state law, Catarina Gonzales has just a few days to find a facility that will agree to sustain Emilio.
“The fact of this matter is, even if this progressive disease will cause him eventually to die, he’s not dead yet,” said Jerri Ward, an attorney who is helping Gonzales. “Dying is not being dead.”
Gonzales knows Emilio will eventually die, but she wants doctors to recognize the value of his life and to give him the best care possible.
“Some days he will hear you, some days he won’t,” Gonzales said of her son. “He’s not completely brain dead.”
