The lawyer of an Italian woman in an irreversible coma said Thursday she may ask courts for an enforcement order to ensure that a landmark right-to-die ruling for Eluana Englaro is respected.
Franca Alessio said the Englaro family legal team are ''studying alternatives'' in case an Udine clinic decides it is not prepared to help 38-year-old Eluana end her life in accordance with a controversial ruling from Italy's supreme court - the country's first right-to-die verdict.
The publicly assisted clinic in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region offered its services in December after the Lombardy region, where Eluana is cared for by nuns at a Lecco clinic, refused to offer clinics or health workers to help Eluana die.
But a last-minute guideline issued by Health Minister Maurizio Sacconi stating that the removal of feeding tubes from patients in a vegetative state was ''illegal'' has so far halted her transfer from Lecco.
The Udine clinic director Claudio Riccobon said Wednesday that the clinic was still clarifying its position and the possible consequences of helping Eluana die in light of Sacconi's directive, but added that it could make a decision by next week.
The Cassation Court in November confirmed a Milan appeals court decision that the feeding tube could be removed from Eluana, who has been in a permanent vegetative state for almost 17 years following a car accident.
The ruling has split Italy, with Catholic politicians and the Vatican claiming it authorises euthanasia and libertarians hailing it as a victory for individual liberty.
Beppino Englaro, who has fought for more than a decade for a dignified end to his daughter's life, has yet to find a clinic willing to remove the tube.
Englaro said Thursday that he could only ''wait for the decisions that will be taken'' about his daughter, adding that it was ''all in the hands of the lawyers''.
The Cassation Court's deputy prosecutor general, Marcello Matera, said in December that Sacconi's guideline did not apply to Eluana's case and added that it would be ''theoretically possible'' to ask the police to see that the sentence is carried out.
PRO-LIFE GROUPS PROTEST.
Also in December, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that an appeal by pro-life groups against the decision was ''inadmissible'' because they had no personal connection with Eluana.
Nevertheless, a pro-life group has since filed another appeal at the Milan appeals court, urging it to review the case in the light of new medical evaluations on Englaro's alleged ability to swallow.
A lawyer for the Englaro family said at the time that the pro-life group did not have a ''legal foundation'' to lodge the plea, adding that it was probably just a ''filibustering'' action.
Neurologist Giuliano Dolce had claimed in the Catholic daily Avvenire that Eluana retains her swallowing reflex and therefore might be able to be eat and drink normally.
But Eluana's neurologist, Carlo Alberto Defanti, has ruled out the possibility that she might be able to be fed by natual means.
He said the swallowing reflex was ''normal'' in patients in a permanent vegetative state and that it was ''not strong enough to permit complete feeding by mouth.
