UPDATED: Doctors Advised Family To Unplug Mandela's Life Support Machine

Doctors treating Nelson Mandela said he was in a "permanent vegetative state" and advised his family to turn off his life support machine a week ago, according to court documents obtained by AFP on Thursday.

"He is in a permanent vegetative state and is assisted in breathing by a life support machine," 

"The Mandela family have been advised by the medical practitioners that his life support machine should be switched off.

"Rather than prolonging his suffering, the Mandela family is exploring this option as a very real probability," said the court filing dated June 26.

Since the document was written, the government, family members and people visiting Mandela have reported his condition has improved.

"He is clearly a very ill man, but he was conscious and he tried to move his mouth and eyes when I talked to him," Denis Goldberg, one of the men who was convicted with Mandela, told AFP after visiting him on Monday.

"He is definitely not unconscious," he said adding that "he was aware of who I was."

Goldberg said he was asked by Mandela's wife Graca Machel to pay him a visit "just to give him mental stimulation."
Meanwhile, a press statement released by the South African Presidency states as follows:

The Presidency has noted media reports about the condition of former President Nelson Mandela and would like to make a clarification.

Former President Mandela has been and remains under the care of a multi-disciplinary panel of South African medical experts drawn from the South Africa Military Health Services, the public sector, the universities and the private sector. Under this panel a team of doctors, nurses, paramedics and other health professionals attend to Madiba on a 24 hour basis.


We confirm our earlier statement released this afternoon after President Jacob Zuma visited Madiba in hospital that Madiba remains in a critical, but stable condition. The doctors deny that the former President is in a vegetative state.



Enquiries: Mac Maharaj 079 879 3203 / macmaharaj@icloud.com.



Issued by: The Presidency

Pretoria