An internationally-respected Catholic bioethics centre has called for urgent reforms of UK law after doctors ended the life of a brain-damaged 12-year-old boy against the wishes of his parents.

Archie Battersbee, 12, died in the Royal London Hospital at 12.15pm on Saturday following the removal of artificial ventilation and other treatment at 10am the same day.

The death of the youngster, who is believed to have been left brain-damaged by an online Tiktok challenge which went wrong, was described by his family as “barbaric”.