A court-appointed guardian is dropping her attempt to force an 11-year-old Amish girl with leukemia to resume chemotherapy after she and her parents fled their home to avoid treatment.
The move filed in court Friday will likely bring an end to a months-long fight between Sarah Hershberger’s family and a hospital that began when her parents decided to halt the treatments because they were making the girl sick.
The guardian, an attorney who’s also a registered nurse, was given the power to make medical decisions for Sarah after an appeals court ruling in October said the beliefs and convictions of the girl’s parents can’t outweigh the rights of the state to protect the child.
But the guardian, Maria Schimer, decided to drop the effort because she doesn’t know where Sarah is now and it has become impossible to monitor her health or make any medical decisions, said Clair Dickinson, an attorney for Schimer.
“It didn’t make sense to drag this on any longer,” he said.
Doctors at Akron Children’s Hospital believe Sarah’s leukemia is treatable, but say she will die within a year if she halts chemotherapy. The hospital went to court after the family decided to stop chemotherapy and treat Sarah with natural medicines, such as herbs and vitamins.
Sarah’s father said the family doesn’t oppose modern medicine and that they didn’t make their decision based on religious reasons.
They ended chemotherapy because it was making her too sick and they feared it could end up killing her, the family’s attorney, Maurice Thompson, said.
For more information: http://lasvegasbadger.blogspot.com/2013/11/i-side-with-amish.html
My guess is that the guardian realized that the parents were a loving family and were looking out for the best interests of the child but had had to give a bogus story to make her look good.
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