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The British Medical Journal's legal correspondent summarizes the 1984 Court of Appeal decision in Gillick v. West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority. Mrs. Gillick, the mother of several daughters under 16, had sued the health authority and the Department of Health and Social Security over the issue of giving contraceptive and abortion advice to minors without notifying their parents and seeking parental consent. The Court ruled that, except in emergencies, the rights and duties of parents are paramount in deciding medical treatment for children under the age of majority. These rights and duties are grounded in British statutory law, and may only be overridden by the courts. In the opinion of the BMJ's correspondent, the Gillick decision's implications are not limited to contraceptive advice and teenage girls, but extend to all medical treatment of minors.
D S. Irvine (Sat,) studied this question.