"Cesarean under duress should be possible '

That put two doctors and two lawyers in the journal Medisch Contact. According to them, the consent of the mother is important, but not necessarily decisive.

It is true that doctors may perform a cesarean section if the mother does not agree to them. Even if the unborn child is at high risk of death or serious harm via a natural birth. But according to the four experts, it should be possible in such cases in order to request a permission right for a Caesarean section.

"Change the law '

According to the doctors and lawyers to the unborn child has rights. "When applying a rule of law leading to death, because as a doctor can not act, then there is something fundamental to the rule."

The authors therefore want that the law be changed to allow doctors through the courts may be authorized for a caesarean. In practice, it means that physicians should call the judge as a pregnant woman refuses a caesarean necessary.

"It can also in the final minutes when the woman is driven to the operating room, the judge may say. I give permission to intervene," said one of the authors, professor of family and juvenile law Paul Vlaardingerbroek in the Volkskrant.

Criticism

Professor of obstetrics Jan Nijhuis (UM) is critical. In the paper he calls a forced cesarean incredibly difficult, since it increases the self-determination of the mother is harmed. "The danger is that the border continues to move up."

Nijhuis also find the problem too rare to settle legal. The past ten years, he has two difficult cases. He says that most parents are convinced eventually.

NOS.nl/ © HOLLANDSE HEIGHT