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It was just after 20.00 when Dr. Amato del Monte, head of resuscitation of the Udine clinic La Quiete, he phoned Beppino Englaro to notify him of the death of his daughter. Eluana, after 17 years of vegetative coma had died on February 8, 2009.
The long trial that involved Eluana Englaro saw an end on February 6, when the doctors suspended the artificial feeding and hydration that kept the girl alive, who has now become a woman. But all the battles of Papa Beppino, which over the years has faced trials, sentences, oppositions, demonstrations and criticisms, no one has forgotten them.
Eluana Englaro and her accident
Eluana Englaro was born on November 26, 1970 in Lombardy. Classical high school diploma, enrolled in the language faculty of the University of Milan. At just 21 years old, the girl loses control of the car on his way home: he hits a light pole and then a tree. Everything happens too fast and by the time the doctors arrive she is already in a coma.
The accident causes severe brain damage and a fractured spine. Doctors save her life, Eluana is out of danger, but he will never come out of that coma again. In 1993, doctors diagnosed a permanent vegetative state due to extensive damage to the cerebral cortex and tissue degeneration.
Eleven years and sixteen sentences: the battle of Beppino Englaro
The authorization to interrupt the artificial feeding to Eluana is given only after years of battles by Beppino. It is he who personally experiences sixteen sentences of the Italian and European judiciary, and it is always he who ends up under the crosshairs of Catholic associations and right-thinking people who they call him a killer.
After becoming Eluana’s tutor, Beppino asked, in 1998, to stop the artificial feeding of his daughter, considered as a therapeutic persistence which therefore went against article 32 of the Constitution. But the court rejects his request and Papa Beppino turns to the Court of Appeal.
Between gaps and open debates, however, the request is again rejected. The case arrives in the Supreme Court which in turn decides to refer the case to a Court of Appeal in Milan. The result is the same: the appeal is rejected. Beppino does not give up, even when the Supreme Court in 2007 excludes artificial feeding from the definition of therapeutic persistence.
The Court, however, highlights another element: the possibility of interrupting artificial feeding if the vegetative state was judged by doctors to be completely irreversible. Thus, on 9 July 2008, the Milan Court of Appeal welcomes Beppino’s appeal authorizing him to interrupt Eluana’s artificial feeding.
But it is not over yet for the Englaro family: the Milan prosecutor’s office, in fact, appeals against the decision of the Court of Appeal which, however, rejects it with a shistorical entity which highlights the legislative vacuum on the issue.
Public opinion
The long procedural question ends up in the newspapers. In those years, the story of Eluana was joined by that of Terri Schiavo. These are the years in which the Church, supported by pro-life associations, invades the streets and squares with candles and processions that plunge the country into a sort of modern inquisition.
In November 2008 the Englaro family was hindered by the nursing home of the Sisters of Mercy of Lecco where Eluana is hospitalized. They refuse to stop the treatment accusing Beppino of wanting to get rid of her. Eluana is thus transferred to the La Quiete clinic, where she will die on February 8, while the others scream “murderer” at Beppino. Who will say: «” No thanks, let me die “. This was what Eluana would have wanted and this was what she had asked for. Let death happen ».
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