Withholding of Medically Indicated Treatment Law and Legal Definition
According to 42 USCS § 5106g(6) [Title 42. The Public Health and Welfare; Chapter 67. Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment and Adoption Reform; General Program ] the term "withholding of medically indicated treatment" means “the failure to respond to the infant's life-threatening conditions by providing treatment (including appropriate nutrition, hydration, and medication) which, in the treating physician's or physicians' reasonable medical judgment, will be most likely to be effective in ameliorating or correcting all such conditions, except that the term does not include the failure to provide treatment (other than appropriate nutrition, hydration, or medication) to an infant when, in the treating physician's or physicians' reasonable medical judgment--
(A) the infant is chronically and irreversibly comatose;
(B) the provision of such treatment would--
(i) merely prolong dying;
(ii) not be effective in ameliorating or correcting all of the infant's life-threatening conditions; or(iii) otherwise be futile in terms of the survival of the infant; or
(C) the provision of such treatment would be virtually futile in terms of the survival of the infant and the treatment itself under such circumstances would be inhumane.”
