Timeline: Charlie Gard and his parents' legal battle to save him

Before his death on Friday, Charlie Gard had been at the centre of a legal fight that progressed through the UK courts to the European court of human rights and back to the high court, with his parents forced to suffer months of anguish as they fought for treatment for their child.

2016

4 August

Charlie Gard is born a “perfectly healthy” baby at full term and at a “healthy weight”.

September

His parents notice he is less able to lift his head and support himself than other babies of a similar age. Doctors discover that he has a rare inherited disease – infantile onset encephalomyopathy mitochondrial DNA depletion syndrome (MDDS).

October

Charlie has become lethargic and his breathing is shallow. He is transferred to Great Ormond Street hospital for children in London on 11 October.

2017

January

A crowdfunding page is set up to help finance trial therapy in the United States.

3 March

Great Ormond Street hospital bosses ask the high court judge, Mr Justice Francis, to rule that life-support treatment should stop.

11 April

The judge says doctors can stop providing life-support treatment after analysing the case at a hearing in the family division of the high court.

3 May

Charlie’s parents ask three court of appeal judges to consider the case but less than three weeks later their appeal is dismissed.

8 June

Charlie’s parents lose their fight in the supreme court.

20 June

The case proceeds to the European court of human rights but a week later it is announced that the European judges have refused to intervene. A Great Ormond Street spokeswoman says there will be “no rush” to change Charlie’s care and says there will be “careful planning and discussion”.

30 June

It is thought that Charlie’s life-support is due to be switched off but his parents say that Great Ormond Street doctors have agreed to “give us a little bit more time” with Charlie. They ask for privacy “while we prepare to say the final goodbye”.

2-3 July

Pope Francis and the US president, Donald Trump, intervene; the former calling for the couple to be allowed to “accompany and treat their child until the end”, saying he has followed the case with “affection and sadness”.

4 July

Bambino Gesu, the Vatican’s children’s hospital in Rome, offers to take Charlie in.

10 July

Charlie’s parents return to the high court and ask Mr Justice Francis to carry out fresh analysis of the case. The judge says he will consider any new evidence.

17 July

Dr Michio Hirano, the New York neurology professor who offered to treat Charlie, travels to London to examine the little boy, discuss the case with Great Ormond Street doctors and other clinicians and examine fresh scans.

21 July

The lawyer representing Great Ormond Street says the new scan makes for “sad reading”.

22 July

Great Ormond Street chairwoman Mary MacLeod says doctors and nurses have been subjected to abuse in the street and received thousands of threatening messages. Charlie’s parents had previously urged people not to send abuse to Great Ormond Street staff.

24 July

The judge’s decision was initially expected the next day but a lawyer representing Charlie’s parents say they are ending their legal fight over his treatment. Their lawyer says “time has run out”.

25 July

Charlie’s mother returns to court to ask a judge to let her son die at home. Gosh opposes the plans on the grounds that it would be impossible to provide Charlie with the specialist care he needs and there would be a risk of a “distressing” death. The judge says that he believes the only two options are hospital or a hospice.

26 July

Charlie’s parents say they want to privately fund hospice treatment for a number of days. Gosh says the proposal is not viable and that Charlie’s hospice stay should be for a shorter period. Mr Justice Francis rules that Charlie will be taken to a hospice if there is no agreement by noon on July 27.

27 July

With the deadline passing, Charlie is transferred to a hospice. The plan drawn up by the court says that life support will be withdrawn soon after the move. Ms Yates says that Gosh has “denied us our final wish”. The hospital says the decision avoids “the risk of an unplanned and chaotic end to Charlie’s life.”

28 July

A family spokeswoman confirms Charlie has died.