Dutch law leads to confusion over when to use life ending treatment in suffering newborns

The Dutch Medical Association is to scrutinise how doctors treat newborn babies with very serious abnormalities after it emerged that uncertainty exists among the profession over the criteria for mercy killing. Experts fear that any uncertainty could jeopardise standards of terminal care.

Since 2007 paediatricians may escape prosecution if they report “actively ending the life of a newborn” and meet certain criteria, including establishing that the baby …