Family council seeks mother’s right to approve medical intervention for children

AMMAN — The National Council for Family Affairs (NCFA) has worked out a legal framework to facilitate children's medical treatment without involving too much red tape that could hinder their access to proper healthcare, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported Saturday. 

The requirements in effect deny women the right to admit their children to hospitals without the consent of the father or a male guardian. The long-time situation was targeted recently by an activist single-handedly. 

The framework includes a number of special legislative changes in regard to medical guardianship, ensuring the mother the right to approve surgeries recommended for her children in emergency cases. 

The legislation needs to be reconsidered urgently, especially after cases where children fell victim to the current system, Petra quoted NCFA Secretary General Fadel Al Homoud as saying.

“Mothers stood helpless when fathers were absent or even dead and could not approve of performing the surgery,” Homoud said, adding that the NCFA appealed in 2009 for changing the requirements through the ministries of justice and health.

Article 123 of the Civil Law for the year 1976 stipulates that medical intervention such as programmed operations for minors requires the approval of a male guardian and lists them in order as the father or anyone the father recommends, then the direct parental grandfather of the child or anyone he recommends, and if they are not available, then it is up to the court to decide who the guardian is.

Earlier this month, Reem Jazi, mother of a three-year-old boy, launched a petition “as a step, aiming eventually at changing Article 123 of the Civil Law for the year 1976”.

“Not being able to admit my son to hospital when needed is outrageous by any means,” Jazi told The Jordan Times in a recent interview.

The petition came almost seven months after the death of a one-week-old baby named Qais after a hospital refused to let his mother admit him for urgent medical intervention because his father did not sign the necessary papers. The case is being heard at a civil court at present.

Commenting on the case of Qais, Health Ministry Spokesperson Hatem Azrui said hospitals “cannot take the responsibility for admitting minors if they do not get the male guardian’s approval and at the same time cannot force people to admit their children. Their role is advisory and it is up to the parents to decide”.

Jazi said she is not calling for cancelling the male guardian’s rights, explaining: “We want to amend the law to grant mothers the same rights that will enable them to look after their children.”