The latest edition of the Medico-Legal Journal has been published.  A joint leader by the legal and medical editors asks if children whose parents refuse to have them vaccinated should be subject to sanctions.

The Journal features Professor Ian Roberts’ address to the Society on “Death and Rebirth of the Autopsy ” which includes discussion of the “Consented Autopsy.”

A former president of the Society, Alec Samuels discusses the liability of the hospital or doctor when a mental patient harms himself or a third party after discharge.

Contributions from outside the Society include an article by a group of authors from Italy reviewing death by electrocution and the appropriate diagnostic techniques. Dr Peter May writes about “Delusional Health Beliefs” and questions whether the late Professor Stephen Hawking was correctly diagnosed as suffering from Motor Neuron Disease.   There is a further contribution from Italy on the need for a multidisciplinary approach to crime scene investigation with reference to a fatal car accident and George Buttigieg from Malta reflects on the Montgomery case and the extent of disclosure required for valid consent to treatment.