The Connecticut Supreme Court has ruled that state officials aren't violating the rights of a 17-year-old girl by forcing her to undergo cancer chemotherapy she doesn't want. In a case that’s drawn national attention, it was standing room only inside the courtroom Thursday afternoon.Justices ruled Thursday in the case of the girl known in court documents only as Cassandra C., who will be free to make her own medical decisions when she turns 18 in September.
The case centered on whether the girl is mature enough to make her own decisions about how to treat her Hodgkin’s lymphoma, which she was diagnosed with this past September. Her mother agreed with her wishes not to receive chemotherapy.
Doctors said chemotherapy would give her an 85 percent chance of survival, but without it she could die.
The girl is in state custody and is receiving chemotherapy at a hospital.
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
