Vincent Lambert has been at centre of bitter family dispute since road accident 11 years ago

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Doctors in France are to begin removing life support from Vincent Lambert, a psychiatric nurse who was paralysed in a road accident in 2008 and has been at the centre of a right-to-die case for more than a decade.

Years of legal battles were fought between two groups of Lambert’s family over whether life support should be switched off, gripping France and drawing in Pope Francis.

On Tuesday, the principal doctor treating the severely brain-damaged Lambert informed the family by email that he intended to start removing his intravenous feeding tubes in line with the most recent French court ruling.

The doctor urged family members to ensure that “support to Mr Vincent Lambert is as peaceful, intimate and personal as possible”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Vincent Lambert’s parents, Pierre and Viviane. Photograph: François Nascimbeni/AFP/Getty Images

Lambert, 42, has been in a vegetative state since the accident, with the question of whether to continue keeping him alive artificially bitterly dividing his family.

Legal battles in French and European courts over the last six years have pitted Lambert’s Catholic parents and two of his siblings – who want to keep him alive – against his wife and six other brothers and sisters who believe the most humane course is to let him die.

His wife Rachel, who is his legal guardian under French law, has maintained that Lambert had made clear before the accident that he would not want to be kept alive artificially, though this was never put in writing.

Multiple medical assessments over the years ordered by the courts have found that Lambert is in an irreversible vegetative state and has no chance of recovering.

Doctors at the hospital in Reims, northern France, have made five attempts previously to remove life support before being forced to reinstate it following court rulings obtained by Lambert’s parents.

The last attempt to remove his tubes was made in May, but was then overturned by a Paris appeals court.

At the time, one of Lambert’s nephews, who was in favour of ending life support, described the constant legal action and reinstatement of treatment as “sadism”. He told AFP: “Vincent Lambert has become a political issue. He’s not considered as a human being any more.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Protesters march in Paris in May to call for Vincent Lambert to be kept alive. Photograph: Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP/Getty Images

Lambert’s parents, who have battled to maintain life support, had previously described stopping medical support as “akin to torture”.

The UN committee on disabled rights has also asked France to keep Lambert alive while it conducts its own investigation into his fate – a request the French government has rejected as non-binding.

In what was hailed as a definitive legal judgment by a lawyer representing Lambert’s wife, France’s top appeals court, the Cour de Cassation, ruled last Friday that life support could be turned off.

The case has rekindled a charged debate over France’s right-to-die laws, which allow so-called “passive” euthanasia for severely ill or injured patients who are being kept alive with no chance of recovery.

Having seen their efforts rejected by France’s highest courts and the European court of human rights, lawyers for Lambert’s parents are threatening to press murder charges if his life support is halted.

His mother, Viviane, who has previously shared photographs and video footage of her son from his hospital bed, has insisted he “just needs something to drink and eat, and love”.

Pope Francis intervened in May when he tweeted to say that it was necessary to “always safeguard life, God’s gift, from its beginning until its natural end”.

President Emmanuel Macron had been called on to act by some campaigners and politicians, but he said it was not his role to get involved. He rejected calls to intervene by Lambert’s parents on the grounds that it was a medical case that should be decided by doctors and Lambert’s wife.