Ashya King treatment: UK doctors ‘threatened to take five-year-old away from family if they questioned his care’, father says
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Version 0 of 1. The father of Ashya King, the five-year-old boy with a brain tumour who was taken to Spain without permission, has said that UK doctors threatened the family with taking their son into care. Speaking outside the centre in Prague where Ashya is to receive advanced proton therapy treatment that is unavailable on the NHS, Brett King said staff at Southampton General Hospital told him they would “take [his] son away” if he questioned their judgement. Ashya’s case sparked an international police manhunt and widespread public outrage after his parents removed him from hospital without doctors’ permission on 28 August. Mr King, 51, and his wife Naghmeh, 45, were arrested in Spain and separated from their son for several days. They had travelled to the country in a bid to sell their holiday home to pay for Ashya’s treatment. The five-year-old is now being treated at the Proton Therapy Centre Czech (PTC) in Prague, where doctors yesterday said that the £70,000 therapy, if effective, would give him a 70 per cent chance of survival. Referring to doctors in the UK, Mr King told the Mirror: “They said to me if I question anything and ask questions as a father, they would take my son away from me. Not just for the treatment but until he was 16. “So I said 'I wouldn't be able to see my son for 11 years'. I said to my wife 'this is something so serious that our son could be taken away until he is 16'. “Eleven years without us, he wouldn't know his parents, his brothers, his sisters or anyone. We couldn't question them any more. We couldn't let them know our feelings because one mistake on our side and they'd take him away.” The hospital declined to comment on the specific claims, but has previously denied that the family were threatened. The Mirror quoted a source who made it clear that “the [NHS] trust absolutely refutes the suggestion this family was threatened”. Meanwhile, the chief executive of University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust revealed yesterday in a blog post that staff at the hospital’s oncology unit had received “abuse” from members of the public since the details of Ashya’s case emerged. Ms Dalton said the hospital’s switchboard had been “overwhelmed with calls from irate members of the public”. But she added that she was pleased Ashya was now being treated, albeit with therapy not available on the NHS. “When [hospital staff-members’] email inboxes were full of personal abuse from strangers, and there were journalists camped on their front door, they were still worrying about how we could do the best thing for a small boy in Spain. “I know that everyone shares my relief that Ashya is now in Prague Motol Hospital, where he will be able to receive the treatment that he needs.” |