Should we feed Thomas Creedon?

Thomas Creedon was brain-damaged in the womb. Now aged 22 months, he is blind and deaf, cannot talk and has no control over his limbs. He cries inconsolably. It is said that he cannot be cuddled properly because touching sends him into painful muscular spasms. He has fits and is fed through a hole in his stomach. Without a miracle, there will be no improvement: we cannot realistically hope for an operation that will make Thomas's life better.

His parents, Con and Fiona Creedon, are brave people. After much deliberation, they have sought permission from the courts that he should be allowed to die. They do not want him to suffer any more.

Hearing of these severe handicaps, many people would reluctantly agree with them. The Creedons have cared for Thomas throughout his life, as well as for their two other children. The NHS has provided a great deal of support, including respite care three days a week, but the emotional strain, never mind much of the physical nursing, inevitably falls on the Creedons. Surely, everyone, including the family, would be better off if this little boy slipped away peacefully.

Yet when Thomas appeared this week on the television, the issue suddenly did not seem so clear cut. This child is evidently not on the verge of death. He is not lying unconscious in a cot, with endless tubes connecting his body to a variety of life-support machines. He is simply fed through a tube.

Certainly, Thomas is appallingly handicapped. But on television, dressed in a T-shirt, washed with his hair combed, his eyes were bright, he looked lively, responsive to his environment, sitting between parents who clearly love him. It was impossible not to think: how could it be right to end Thomas's life?

Nothing will be switched off. Thomas will die, like any other child of his age, if he is not fed. The artificial tube would have to be withdrawn. He would die from lack of fluids. Doctors would ensure that he died peacefully without pain. But this prospect is still hard to accept, this week of all weeks, as Britain mourns the death of three other children, albeit in circumstances very different from the Creedon case.

It is said that Thomas's situation is like the case of Tony Bland, a victim of the 1989 Hillsborough disaster, who was left brain-dead after being crushed. Mr Bland was unconscious, unaware of his surroundings, in what is known as a persistent vegetative state. In 1992 the House of Lords agreed that doctors should stop his artificial feeding and so he died. Since then, there have been five other similar decisions involving people in a persistent vegetative state.

But Thomas is different from Tony Bland. He is conscious, his brain is active. Indeed, the chief difference between him and other very severely handicapped people is that he is fed via a tube rather than by hand. So denying him food and water would represent a dramatic change in the law. In creating this precedent, it could affect the existing right to life of many disabled people, including the elderly, who cannot speak for themselves. Who are we to decide that, because of profound disability, they do not lead worthwhile lives and should be helped to die?

Most people will find it difficult to make up their minds in this case, which is fraught with complex moral issues and which breaks fresh legal ground. The judicial process is likely to take up to two years, during which time the question will be thoroughly debated. One can only feel immense sympathy for the Creedons. But given what we know so far, it would be wrong to let Thomas Creedon die from lack of nourishment. To stop feeding him would have implications too serious for thousands of vulnerable people whose lives may also seem marginal.