Terri Schiavo is almost certain to die in the next few days after the US Supreme Court today refused to order the brain-damaged woman's feeding tube be re-inserted.

The court rejected a desperate appeal by her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, to keep their severely brain-damaged daughter alive. It was their last avenue of appeal and came despite unprecedented intervention by Congress and President Bush in the past week.

In a terse one-page statement, the court announced it would not intervene, but did not explain the decision. It was at least the fifth time the court has declined to become involved in the Schiavo case.

The feeding tube that has kept Mrs Schiavo alive for the past 15 years was removed last Friday.

The highest court's decision was the latest in a string of losses in state and federal courts for the Schindlers, who say their 41-year-old daughter faces an unjust and imminent death based on a decision by Michael Schiavo, her estranged husband, to halt nourishment without proof of her consent.

The Schindlers' emergency high court filing also argued that Congress intended for Schiavo's tube to be reinserted, at least temporarily, when it passed an extraordinary bill last weekend giving federal courts authority to fully review her case.

In his response, Mr Schiavo urged justices not to intervene because his wife's case already has been endlessly litigated and every time the courts have agreed with him.

His filing also argued that Congress violated the Constitution when it passed the bill because the action was improperly intended to overturn state court rulings on the matter.

"That is not an exercise of legislative power, but trial by legislature," the filing said.

The Schindlers' appeal went first to Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was appointed by President Reagan and has taken a moderate position on social issues. He referred the Schiavo case to the full nine-member court.

The court's decision does not come as a surprise. Not only had judges repeatedly declined to intervene in the Schiavo case in the past, but they also routinely defer to state courts on family law issues.

Judges in various Florida courts have sided with Mr Schiavo the 15 years since she suffered brain damage, caused by a heart attack.

President Bush conceded yesterday that he and the US Congress had no other options to keep Mrs Schiavo alive, having rushed through emergency legislation at the weekend to force the federal courts to hear the case. The Florida state courts had already ruled, based on the evidence, that Mrs Schiavo would want to die.

The President reacted after a federal appeals court in Atlanta ruled 2-1 that her parents had "failed to demonstrate a substantial case on the merits of any of their claims" that their daughter's feeding tube should be reinserted.

The ruling was seen as a rebuff to Mr Bush and Capitol Hill's Republican leadership, who forced through the legislation.

The Schindlers' fading hopes now lie mainly with the President's brother. In another extraordinary intervention, Jeb Bush, the Governor of Florida, asserted last night that he had new evidence from a "renowned neurologist" that Mrs Schiavo had been misdiagnosed and was not in a persistent vegetative state.

Bill Frist, the Republican Senate leader, who is a transplant surgeon, wrote to Governor Bush urging him to lobby the Florida state legislature to pass emergency legislation that would make it illegal to allow any brain-damaged patient in the state to die. But last night the Florida Senate voted 21-18 against a bill to intervene to prolong Mrs Schiavo's life.

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