Britain’s High Court has ruled that the parents of Ashya King, the five-year-old boy with a brain tumour, may take him to the Czech Republic for cancer treatment.
They want him to receive proton beam therapy there because it’s not available from Britain’s health service.
The couple were arrested in Spain after removing him from a British hospital against medical advice following a disagreement with doctors about his treatment.
Brett and Naghemeh King had travelled to Spain where they planned to sell a property to pay for their son’s treatment.
Proton beam therapy promises the benefits of radiation therapy. Experts say it is less damaging to the patient.
“With the proton therapy you reduce the risk of irradiating something which doesn’t need to be irradiated because you target exactly the tumour,” explained Iva Tatounova,
Director of Strategy at Prague’s Proton Therapy Centre.
Ashya’s treatment would last four to five weeks, according to Tatounova. When it is finished she says his tumour will be gone.
Ashya would still have to have regular screening for to see if he has gone into remission or not.
Proton therapy at the centre in Prague costs around 48,000 euros for the type of treatment Ashya needs.
