Nineteen professionals are being prosecuted after a boy was left disabled when medics gave him laughing gas instead of oxygen during a routine operation to fix a cross-eye.

Ege Avci, 10, was mistakenly given nitrous oxide instead of oxygen while under anaesthetic at Izmir Torbali State Hospital in Turkey.

He had gone in for the operation to fix his non-aligned eyes on 10th December 2018 and, shockingly, spent 19 minutes hooked up to the dangerous gas.

During that time, his heart stopped and he suffered brain swelling. Medics managed to revive him, but he had to spend the next two months under treatment.

He was ruled to have developed cerebral palsy as a result of the bungle and was given a ‘100 per cent’ disability rating. His family then filed a complaint with the Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office in Torbali.

Prosecutors are now demanding prison sentences of up to 18 months for 19 individuals on charges of negligence resulting in injury.

Their investigation report has said that three of the individuals bear ‘primary’ guilt, while nine bear ‘secondary’ guilt. The remainder bear ‘tertiary’ guilt.

They have not been able to ascertain the identity of one of the three suspects bearing primary guilt. They named the other two as Ali Y. and Fatih K.

The report said the fatal error occurred after the hospital’s gas delivery system malfunctioned and was incorrectly fixed.

Legal proceedings against the individuals are ongoing.