The applicant alleged that the collection of her personal medical data by a State agency without her consent had violated her right to respect for her private life.

Judgment delivered on 29 April 2014 (final on 29 July 2014): the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life).

Radu v. the Republic of Moldova (50073/07)

The applicant complained about a State-owned hospital’s disclosure of medical information about her to her employer, the Policy Academy. She was pregnant with twins and hospitalised for a fortnight due to a risk of her miscarrying. The information was widely circulated at the applicant’s place of work and, shortly afterwards, she had a miscarriage due to stress.

Judgment delivered on 15 April 2014 (final on 15 July 2014); the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life).

Konovalova v. Russia (37873/04)

The applicant complained about the unauthorised presence of medical students during the birth of her child, alleging that she had not given written consent to being observed and had been barely conscious when told of such arrangements.

Judgment delivered on 9 October 2014 (not final): the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life). It found in particular that the relevant national legislation at the time of the birth of the applicant’s baby did not contain any safeguards to protect patients’ privacy rights.

Liability of health professionals

· Judgment delivered

Gray v. Germany (49278/09)

The case concerned the death of a patient in his home in the United Kingdom as a result of medical malpractice by a Germany doctor recruited by a private agency to work for the British National Health Service. The patient’s sons complained that the authorities in Germany, where the doctor was tried and convicted of having caused the death by negligence, had not provided for an effective investigation into their father’s death.

Judgment delivered on 22 May 2014 (final on 13 October 2014): the Court held that there had been no violation of Article 2 (right to life).

· Friendly settlement

Nikolova v. “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” (75971/12)

The applicant complained about the dismissal of her compensation claim lodged against a hospital concerning alleged malpractice. On 23 May 2014, the Court received a friendly-settlement declaration dated 24 April 2014 with respect to the question of pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and legal costs and expenses. On 1 July 2014, the Court decided to strike the application out of its list of cases.

Access to experimental treatment

· Admissibility decision

Durisotto v. Italy (62804/13) (French only)

The case concerned the refusal by the Italian courts to authorise the applicant’s daughter to undergo compassionate therapy (experimental treatment known as the “Stamina” method) to treat her degenerative cerebral illness. The therapy was undergoing clinical trials and, under a legislative decree, was subjected to restrictive access criteria. The applicant alleged in particular that the legislative decree in question had introduced discrimination in access to care between persons who had already begun treatment prior to the entry into force of the decree and those who – like his daughter – were not in that situation.

On 6 May 2014, the Court declared the application inadmissible (manifestly ill-founded) under Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) and under Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) taken in conjunction with Article 8 of the Convention.

Ethical issues concerning HIV

· Application pending before the Grand Chamber

S.J. v. Belgium (70055/10) (French only)

The applicant, an HIV-positive Nigerian national, alleges in particular that there are serious and established grounds to believe that if she were returned to Nigeria, she would face a real risk of being subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment, on account of the fact that the complex antiretroviral therapy which guarantees her survival is neither available nor accessible.

Judgment delivered on 27 February 2014: the Court found that there would be no violation of Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) in the event of the applicant being removed to Nigeria. The Court further held a violation of Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) taken in conjunction with Article 3, finding that the applicant had not had an effective remedy. On 7 July 2014 the case was referred to the Grand Chamber at the request of the applicant and the Belgian Government. The Court will hold a Grand Chamber hearing in the case on 18 February 2015.

Reproductive rights

· Judgment delivered

A.K. v. Latvia (33011/08)

The applicant alleged in particular that she had been denied adequate and timely medical care in the form of an antenatal screening test which would have indicated the risk of her foetus having a genetic disorder and would have allowed her to choose whether or not to continue the pregnancy. She also complained that the national courts; by wrongly interpreting the Medical Treatment Law, had failed to establish an infringement of her right to respect for her private life.

Judgment delivered on 24 June 2014 (final 24 September 2014): the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) in its procedural aspect

· Application pending before the Grand Chamber

Parrillo v. Italy (46470/11) (French only)

In 2002 the applicant and her partner, who has since died, underwent in vitro fertilisation treatment which produced five embryos. The applicant wishes to donate the embryos for scientific research into ways of curing diseases difficult to treat. However, a law which entered into force in Italy in 2004 (Law no. 40/2004) prohibits experiments on human embryos, even for the purposes of scientific research, making such an offence punishable by a sentence of between two and six years’ imprisonment. The applicant submits that the embryos in question were created prior to the entry into force of Law no. 40/2004 and that it was therefore entirely legal for her to store the embryos by means of cryopreservation without having them implanted immediately.

On 28 January 2014, the Chamber to which the case had been allocated relinquished jurisdiction in favour of the Grand Chamber. On 18 June 2014, the Court held a Grand Chamber hearing in the case.

Surrogacy

· Judgments delivered

Mennesson v. France (65192/11) and Labassee v. France (65941/11) (Labassee in French only)

Both cases concerned the refusal to grant legal recognition in France to parent-child relationships that had been legally established in the United States between children born as a result of surrogacy treatment and the couples who had had the treatment.

Judgments delivered on 26 June 2014 (final 26 September 2014): the Court held that there had been no violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) concerning the applicants’ right to respect for family life. On the other hand, the Court held a violation of Article 8 concerning the children’s right to respect for their private life. The Court observed that the French authorities, despite being aware that the children had been identified in the United States as the children of Mr and Mrs Mennesson and Mr and Mrs Labassee, had denied them that status under French law. It considered that this contradiction undermined the children’s identity within French society.

· Decision

D. and Others v. Belgium (29176/13) (French only)

The case concerned the Belgian authorities’ initial refusal to authorise the arrival on its national territory of a child who had been born in Ukraine from a surrogate pregnancy as resorted to by the applicants, two Belgian nationals. The applicants relied in particular on Articles 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) and 8 (right to respect for private and family life).

In view of developments in the case since the application was lodged, namely the granting of a laissez-passer for the child and his arrival in Belgium, where he has since lived with the applicants, the Court considered this part of the dispute to be resolved and struck out of its list the complaint. The Court further declared inadmissible the remainder of the application.

Euthanasia and assisted suicide

· Judgment delivered

Gross v. Switzerland (67810/10) (French only)

The case concerned the complaint of an elderly woman, who had wishes to end her life but had not been suffering from a clinical illness, that she had been unable to obtain the Swiss authorities’ permission to be provided with a lethal dose of a drug in order to commit suicide.

It its Chamber judgment on 14 May 2013, the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private life) finding in particular that Swiss law was not clear enough as to when assisted suicide was permitted. The case was subsequently referred to the Grand Chamber at the request of the Swiss Government. In January 2014, the Swiss Government informed the Court that it had learned that the applicant had died in November 2011.

In its Grand Chamber judgment of 30 September 2014, the Court has, by a majority, declared the application inadmissible. It considered she had taken special precautions to prevent information about her death from being disclosed to her counsel, and thus to the Court, in order to prevent the latter from discontinuing the proceedings in her case, which had constituted an abuse of the right of individual application. As a result of this judgment, the findings of the Chamber judgment of 14 May 2013, which had not become final, are no longer legally valid.

· Pending case

Lambert and Others v. France (46043/14) (French only)

The applicants are the parents, a half-brother and a sister of Vincent Lambert who sustained a head injury in a road-traffic accident in 2008 as a result of which he is tetraplegic and in a state of total dependence. He is hospitalised in Reims University Hospital, where he receives hydration and nutrition through a gastric tube. The applicants complain in particular about the judgment delivered on 24 June 2014 by the French Conseil d’Etat which, relying on, among other things, a medical report drawn up by a panel of three doctors, declared lawful the decision taken on 11 January 2014, by the doctor treating Vincent Lambert, to discontinue his artificial nutrition and hydration.

On 24 June 2014, the Court communicated the application to the French Government and indicated that, pursuant to Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, in the interests of the parties and the proper conduct of the proceedings before it, they should stay the execution of the Conseil d’Etat’s decision for the duration of the proceedings before the Court.

On 7 October 2014, the Chamber to which the application had been assigned announced its intention to relinquish jurisdiction in favour of the Grand Chamber. The parties have been informed and have one month from the date of this notification within which to submit to the Registry, in writing, a duly reasoned objection.

Organ transplantation

· Judgment delivered

Petrova v. Latvia (4605/05)

Having sustained life-threatening injuries in a car accident, the applicant’s son was taken to hospital where he died. Shortly afterwards, a laparotomy was performed on his body, in the course of which his kidneys and spleen were removed for organ-transplantation purposes. The applicant alleged that the removal of her son’s organs had been carried out without her or her son’s prior consent and that, in any event, no attempt had been made to establish her views.

Judgment delivered on 24 June 2014 (final on 24 September 2014): the Court held a violation of Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life).

B. MENTAL HEALTH

· Judgments delivered

Centre for Legal Resources on behalf of Valentin Câmpeanu v. Romania (47848/08)

The case concerned the death of a young man of Roma origin - who was HIV positive and suffering from a severe mental disability - in a psychiatric hospital. The application was lodged on his behalf by a non-governmental organisation, the Centre for Legal Resources (CLR). The latter complained that Mr Câmpeanu had been placed in medical institutions which were not equipped to provide adequate care for his condition; that he had been transferred from one unit to another without proper diagnosis and that the authorities had failed to ensure his appropriate treatment with antiretroviral medication. Furthermore, there had been no effective investigation into the circumstances of his death.

Firstly, the Court found that, in the exceptional circumstances of the case, and bearing in mind the serious nature of the allegations, it was open to the NGO to act as a representative of Mr Câmpeanu, even though the organisation was not itself a victim of the alleged violations. In its Grand Chamber judgment delivered on 17 July 2014, the Court held, unanimously, that there had been a violation of Article 2 (right to life), in both its substantive and procedural aspects, and Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) in conjunction with Article 2.

Bljakaj and Others v. Croatia (74448/12)

The applicants complained that the authorities had failed to take the necessary measures to protect a lawyer (a member of their family) who was shot dead by one of her clients’ husband, who was mentally disturbed.

Judgment delivered on 18 September 2014: the Court held a violation of Article 2 (right to life), but no violation of Article 13 (right to an effective remedy). The Court noted that the police had been aware that the man who killed the applicants’ relative had a history of violent offences. Although shortly before the shooting he had been under police control, appearing mentally disturbed and dangerous to others, the officers in charge had left him without supervision and had only belatedly reported the situation to the medical authorities.

PART II FACTSHEETS PREPARED BY THE COURT’S PRESS SERVICE

Prepared by the Court’s Press Service, Factsheets focus on the case law of the Court, and pending cases. These files are not exhaustive and do not bind the Court. The date indicates the latest update of the factsheet.

- Personal data protection (September 2014)

- Health (October 2014)

- Mental health (May 2013)

- Detention and mental health (January 2014)

- Prisoners’ health-related rights (October 2014)

- Euthanasia and assisted suicide (September 2014)

- Reproductive rights (September 2014)

- Right to life (June 2013)

- New technologies (September 2014)