A 12-year-old British boy, whose parents sought legal action to continue life-sustaining treatments after he was thought to be brain dead, has passed away.

Archie Battersbee had his life support switched off after having been in a coma for four months.

"It's with my deepest sympathy and sadness to tell you all that Archie passed at 12:15pm today," the boy's mother, Hollie Dance, said.

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"Can I just say that I'm the proudest mum in the world, such a beautiful little boy, and he fought right until the very end, and I'm so proud to be his mum."

A British judge on Friday rejected a request from the parents of Archie to let them move him to a hospice when hospital doctors withdraw his life-support treatment.

After High Court Judge Lucy Theis rejected the family's request on Friday morning, Archie's parents asked the Court of Appeal for permission to challenge the ruling.

When that court refused to take the case late in the day, they applied to the European Court of Human Rights to intervene.

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Archie's care had been the subject of weeks of legal arguments as his parents sought to force the Royal London Hospital to continue life-sustaining treatments after doctors argued there was no chance of recovery and he should be allowed to die.

The family were seeking to move Archie to a hospice after the courts ruled it was in his best interests to end treatment.

The hospital said Archie's condition was so unstable that moving him would hasten his death.

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Theis ruled on Friday morning that Archie should remain in the hospital while treatment was withdrawn.

Ella Carter, the fiance of Archie's eldest brother, Tom, said Archie was stable for about two hours after the hospital stopped medication.

Carter said doctors removed his ventilation before he went "completely blue".

"There is absolutely nothing dignified about watching a family member or child suffocate," said a member of the family.

"No family should ever have to go through what we've been through.

"It's barbaric."

Archie was found unconscious at home with a ligature over his head on April 7.

His parents believe he may have been taking part in an online challenge that went wrong.

Reported with the Associated Press.

Two bushwalkers have been winched to safety and treated for mild hypothermia after spending the night trapped in the Blue Mountains in New South Wales.

At about 6pm on Saturday, a 25-year-old man and an 18-year-old woman set off an emergency beacon at Mount Tomah.

The pair had been abseiling and canyoning near Clausters Canyon when they got into trouble and called for help.

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About four hours later, emergency services attempted to rescue the couple but were unable to reach them due to poor conditions and the mission was suspended.

The rescue operation continued at 7.30am this morning, where Police Air located and winched the hikers to safety.

Two Police Rescue officers were then also winched to safety.

Greg Marshall from NSW Ambulance praised the hikers for bringing a distress beacon with them, noting it may have saved their lives.

"This couple were very cold when we got to them and temperatures close to zero degrees made it an uncomfortable night," he said.

"They did the right thing in taking an EPIRB distress beacon with them, and activating it when they got into trouble.

"The coordinates we received helped our aeromedical team locate them and get assistance to them.

"It's an important lesson for everybody who goes out into the bush – take an EPIRB with you. It can be a life-saving device.

"This was a tricky and prolonged rescue operation with all agencies involved working well together for a good outcome."

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The Victorian government has rejected the Ombudsman's recommendation that it compensate residents who were "inhumanely" shut out of the state during last year's COVID-19 lockdown.

The government ruled it would not offer compensation back in May, however the decision has only just come to light, as it was published on an obscure part of a government website.

Thousands of Victorians were locked out of the state on July 23, 2021, when the state government closed the NSW border for the first time in 100 years due to the large outbreak of COVID-19 in NSW.

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The Victorian Ombudsman investigated how the government handled the border closure, and tabled recommended actions for the government to take, including the suggestion that the government consider financially compensating those affected, in parliament in December.

Victorian Ombudsman Deborah Glass' investigation found that the border closure process led to "some of the most questionable decisions (she had) seen in (her) over seven years as Ombudsman", leading to a "torrent of anger and grief".

"The closure of Victoria's borders in July 2021 impacted thousands of Victorians in ways few, if any, could ever have contemplated," her report read.

It explained that on July 20, 2021, Victorian residents in red zones were given 12 hours to cross the border, which was "an impossibility for many, especially the elderly or those with young children in remote parts of NSW", before the lockout began on July 23.

Only people with valid exemptions were then allowed to return to Victoria.

The Ombudsman said complaints she received about people not granted an exemption were "heartbreaking", including people who had travelled to visit ill relatives and people made homeless because their homes were in Victoria.

Only eight per cent of the 33,252 exemption applications filed between July 9 and September 14, 2021, were granted by the government, with many applications failing because people did not have the documentation requested by the government.

"Rather than fairly considering individual circumstances and the risks associated with them, the exemptions scheme was a blunt instrument that resulted in unjust outcomes, potentially for thousands of people," the Ombudsman concluded.

Glass said it was hard to comprehend why some applications were not granted.

"Aside from the myriad of cases that should have been cause for compassion, it is difficult to understand how a fully vaccinated person, testing negative to COVID-19, willing to self-quarantine on arrival, and able to drive to their destination on one tank of fuel, could pose such a risk to public health to justify refusing an exemption."

"The effect of a complex and constrained bureaucracy meant some outcomes were downright unjust, even inhumane."

The Victorian government published its response to the recommendation that those who experienced the "unjust outcomes" be offered payment in a report published on its website on or before May 27.

"While the Victorian government is not considering making ex gratia payments for those Victorians who were unable to travel home during this period, it does acknowledge the distress and disruption that the border restrictions generally created," the government's statement reads.

"It also acknowledges the frustration and challenges that people experienced when attempting to obtain an exemption in these difficult circumstances when the risks presented to the public health of Victorians by COVID-19 was constantly evolving."

It is understood that the publishing of the government's response was not shared with media or on social media.

A man has died while being restrained by police after he allegedly crashed a car through a fence in Melbourne's north.

Officers found the man inside a car on Murphy Street in Preston about 4am after they received reports a car had crashed through a fence and into a front yard.

The man was seen "behaving erratically" inside the car, before he got out of the car and confronted the officers, according to Victoria Police.

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The officers tried to restrain the man before he appeared to become unresponsive, police have said.

The officers immediately called for medical assistance and performed CPR on the man but he could not be revived.

Police have advised that Homicide Squad detectives will investigate the incident with oversight from Professional Standards Command, as is the standard practice when a person dies in police custody.

Anyone with information about the incident has been urged to contact police.

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A leading Victorian doctor has agreed the state's healthcare system is "absolutely overwhelmed" after it was revealed more than 87,000 people are awaiting elective surgery.

Dr Roderick McRae, the Victorian president of the Australian Medical Association, has told Today "the entire system is stressed" in Victoria, confirming it is even difficult to get an appointment with a GP.

He has spoken after the Victorian government released its latest healthcare performance data, revealing blowouts in ambulance and hospital wait times.

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"All of the statistics are indicating that absolutely every point of the healthcare system in Victoria is absolutely overwhelmed," he said.

"It's difficult to get an appointment for a general practitioner, so if you have a sick child you go to the emergency department and then you suddenly see the queues.

"Everything is very, very tight."

Dr McRae has compared the situation in Victoria to what occurred in the US after the Spanish Flu.

"In Victoria we're busy absolutely reproducing everything that occurred in the United States a hundred years ago after the Spanish flu."

He said everyone getting back to normal life after COVID-19 lockdowns, going out to restaurants and cinemas, meant COVID-19, the flu and RSV were being transmitted.

"There's just more and more presentations to every part of the healthcare system."

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The latest data has revealed there are still more than 87,000 Victorians needing planned procedures.

Casey Hospital deputy director of emergency medicine Dr Nathan Bushby said a row of temporary modular units had been opened up to meet demand.

"These have been opened up to help us treat the massive increase in respiratory illnesses, including COVID-19 that we're seeing across this winter," Bushby said.

After repeated requests, the state government has released the latest quarterly healthcare figures.

Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas said Victoria was currently experiencing "unprecedented demand".

Between April and June, more than 486,000 patients presented to emergency departments across the state, a 5 per cent jump.

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"It's certainly the busiest I've ever seen it in my 25 years as a doctor," Bushby said.

Meanwhile Ambulance Victoria experienced the busiest quarter in its history.

There were more than 97,000 code one dispatches, which are cases requiring lights and sirens.

This represented a 16 per cent increase.

Opposition spokesperson Georgie Crozier said "every case counts for a code one".

"Those targets are nowhere near being met," Crozier said.

Forty-six per cent of the most urgent call outs were not attended to within the required 15 minutes.

"We've never pretended that there is a quick fix," Thomas said.

There was a dent in the elective surgery waitlist, with just over 87,000 patients now in the queue.

But pre-pandemic those waiting for planned procedures was down around 50,000.

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