Parents of severely disabled Tafida Raqeed, five, win the right to keep her on life support

Seriously ill Tafida Raqeeb was today granted a chance at life – as a judge ruled doctors were not allowed to switch off her life-support.

In a sensational victory at the High Court, the five-year-old’s family succeeded where those of Charlie Gard and Alfie Evans failed.

They persuaded a judge that stricken Tafida should be given more time to recover from her brain injury.

The little girl’s parents blinked back tears as Mr Justice MacDonald delivered the news they had desperately been hoping for.

Her mother, 39-year-old solicitor Shelina Begum, and construction consultant father Mohammed Raqeeb, 45, now want to take their daughter to Italy for treatment as soon as possible.

Today in the Family Division of the High Court in London, Tafida Raqeeb’s parents Mohammed Raqeeb (left) and Shelina Begum (right) won a shocking victory to keep their daughter alive

Mr Justice MacDonald said: ‘The effect of these decisions is that either the NHS Trust or Gaslini or another hospital will have to continue treating Tafida with life sustaining treatment.

‘It is to be anticipated that this transfer [to Italy] is to take place.’

The judge told the parents: ‘I want, now that my part of this being over, to wish you both well to wish Tafida well – you have all my best wishes for the future.’

Shelina Begum obtained a fatwa, an Islamic religious ruling, that it was ‘impermissible for the parents, or anyone else, to give consent for the removal of the life-supporting machine from their child’.

Mr Justice McDonald said that the fatwa was ‘a valuable restatement of the sanctity of life, a sanctity recognised by all the great religions and also by those who view life through a secular or scientific prism’.

But in summing up his decision-making, he concluded: ‘The gold standard against which cases of this nature are measured and determined remains that of the child’s best interests and as the march of medical innovation continues to bring cases of this nature before the courts, the courts will be required to apply this standard to the best of their ability.’

Her parents have waged a lengthy fight against Barts doctors to have her transferred from London’s Royal London Hospital to Genoa in Italy where doctors will continue treatment

David Lock QC, for the parents, said they were ‘enormously relieved’.

He added: ‘They have been under the most intolerable pressure for the last few months and Your Lordship’s swift and courteous and sensitive handling has done everything it could to make an impossible situation more bearable.’

Katie Gollop QC, for the hospital, said her clients were ‘grappling’ with the decision which ‘clearly have ramifications that go beyond Tafida’.

She told the judge that his ruling could have implications for other children.

She indicated that an appeal would be considered.

Lawyers said Mr Justice MacDonald could be asked to halt Tafida’s move pending an appeal at a further High Court hearing on Friday.

Ms Begum said, after Thursday’s ruling, that the fight had been ‘exhausting’ and traumatic’.

‘We have always had Tafida’s best interests at heart and we have never wanted to come to court to have to argue for our rights to seek continued care in a world-class hospital willing to give her the treatment she needs,’ she said.

‘The entire experience of having to fight for our daughter’s life over the last three months has been exhausting and traumatic for all of her family.’

She added: ‘It is vital for Tafida that she is removed from the Royal London Hospital and transferred to the Gaslini … at the earliest opportunity. This is our priority for Tafida.’

A lawyer who represented Tafida’s parents said they hoped to transfer the youngster to Italy in the next 10 days.

Lawyers had told Mr Justice MacDonald that Tafida’s case had echoes of similar high-profile life-support treatment cases involving three children – Charlie Gard, Alfie Evans and Isaiah Haastrup.

Judges concluded that all three of those children should be allowed to die. 

The family has been told Tafida, pictured above after the incident, could live another 20 years

A blood vessel burst in Tafida’s head in February and Royal London Hospital doctors concluded she could no longer move, see or feel.

They said she had no prospect of getting better and asked the High Court for permission to withdraw her life supporting treatment.

During a five-day hearing last month, Tafida’s mother begged the judge to spare her child.

She sobbed in the witness box as she insisted her daughter was improving and responding to her family.

The schoolgirl’s parents, from Newham, east London, have been told by independent specialists she could make a partial recovery from the severe brain injury if given a year or more, and with rehabilitation could live another 20 years.

They want to take her to Italy, where the Gaslini children’s hospital in Genoa – dubbed Italy’s equivalent of Great Ormond Street – has offered to continue treating her.

The family told the court that unlike other similar cases, such as tragic Charlie Gard, Tafida’s condition was stable.

‘Tafida is not dying. She is not suffering. She just needs time,’ said her mother.

But the hospital’s lawyer argued the ‘bubbly, bright, clever, bilingual, warmhearted’ girl their daughter was before the injury could never be brought back.

Katie Gollop QC, for Barts NHS Trust which runs the hospital, said the schoolgirl had ‘no prospect of recovery’ and more treatment would be ‘harmful and inhumane’.

She added: ‘The trust wishes to say to her parents how very, very, very sorry it is about what happened to Tafida, and it knows how much dedication, love and devotion they have shown to her.’

She said doctors had done everything they could for Tafida but there was no treatment or cure that could save her, adding: ‘We cannot always have what we want. We must face facts.’

However the little girl’s mother told the court: ‘Tafida actually knows my presence.

‘I’m the one who spends the entire day there, and I’m the one who sees improvements every day.’

She rejected a suggestion that Tafida’s movements were ‘random’.

Mr Justice MacDonald posed the idea that ‘it might be said that ten to 20 years of ‘unawareness’ might be a price worth paying…whereas ten to 20 years of suffering might not be’.

On the final day of last month’s trial, he said he would ‘go away and think very carefully about everything I have been told’ before delivering his decision.

The family’s lawyer expressed their profound thanks to the judge after he ruled this morning that Tafida can be moved in Italy.