What is the ruling on removing life support equipment from a patient whom the doctors have determined will not recover?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
This is a questioner from outside this country. He says: One of my relatives is in a coma due to a brain tumor, may Allah protect us and you. He says the brain has stopped functioning, and he is on machines that help him breathe. His question is: The doctors say now that he will not wake up, so is it permissible
The Shaykh:
That he will not wake up. He will not wake up. Yes.
The questioner:
He will not wake up, so is it permissible to stop these machines before he dies and his heart stops on its own?
The Shaykh:
By Allah, if there is no hope for his life, and a decision has been issued by the senior scholars that if his life is dependent on these machines, and if they are removed he will die, and the machines are needed by other people, they said: remove the machines from him if the doctors decide so. Yes. Because his remaining on them brings him no benefit. Yes.
This is a questioner from outside this country. He says: One of my relatives is in a coma due to a brain tumor, may Allah protect us and you. He says the brain has stopped functioning, and he is on machines that help him breathe. His question is: The doctors say now that he will not wake up, so is it permissible
The Shaykh:
That he will not wake up. He will not wake up. Yes.
The questioner:
He will not wake up, so is it permissible to stop these machines before he dies and his heart stops on its own?
The Shaykh:
By Allah, if there is no hope for his life, and a decision has been issued by the senior scholars that if his life is dependent on these machines, and if they are removed he will die, and the machines are needed by other people, they said: remove the machines from him if the doctors decide so. Yes. Because his remaining on them brings him no benefit. Yes.
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، ما حكم رفع أجهزة الإنعاش عن المريض الذي قرر الأطباء عدم شفائه؟ لمعالي الشيخ صالح الفوزان — youtube.com
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.