MilitantModerate

<a href="http://www.canada.com/edmonton/story.asp?id={AB74EEB8-866C-40AA-BA2A-E9CB8DB9370F}" target="_blank">http://www.canada.com/edmonton/story.asp?id={AB74EEB8-866C-40AA-BA2A-E9CB8DB9370F}</a>

This is actually from a case that has been going on almost a year that may have have been previously discussed. The girl was initially required, by court order, to take the transfusions and then later stopped.

Ironically I just gave blood yesterday.

[ September 07, 2002: Message edited by: MilitantModerate ]</p>

abe smith

uh. We better-informed 21st C. teeps can plead that the JWs's reason for forbidding transfusion (because it violates the Biblical rule against 'eating blood") is fullish.... But in fact & de facto we have learnt recently (even we skeptics who reject all that religious junk-thinking) -- we have learnt recently that current screening methods by the agencies we are advised to TRUST are NOT adequate! Arthur Ashe and numbers of others have died innocently of AIDS infection from inadequately-screened blood transfusion; and the latest news is that other innocents have been infected w/ & have died similarly of West Nile infections.
Maybe the JWs (w/ whose fantasies I have NO sympathy whatever) are empirically-correct in their position. Abe

MilitantModerate

Without minimizing lax screening or bureaucratic bungling and sluggishness one must realize that no system can be perfect and hindsight is 20/20. More importantly since many, if not most, who receive transfusions or products would not survive without them; the system saves many more lives than it harms.

echidna

There would appear to be an element of natural selection at work.

excreationist

From <a href="http://www.ajwrb.org/index.shtml" target="_blank">Associated Jehovah's Witnesses for Reform on Blood</a>:


"The cover of the May 22, 1994 Awake! magazine showing photos of 26 children, with the caption: "Youths Who Put God First." Inside the magazine glorifies Witness children who died supporting WTS policy."

The site also says that Watchtower policy now says that highly purified cow's blood and all human blood components are now permitted for transfusions.

Agnos1

Some of you appear to condone the mass suicide the JW's are advocating. Years ago it was organ transplants that were disallowed, now it's okay, which doesn't do much good for all those JW's who died needlessly. Blood platelletes seem to be approved at present.

Arthur Ashe's death is by no means a recent event. Since then the blood supply has improved immensely. The risk is bearable, considering that most diseases could be treated after the successful blood transfusion, a procedure that saves thousands per year.

Tom Sawyer

If a person is a JW and as a result of his religious choice he chooses not to get a blood transfusion and dies, I believe that he is well within his rights to do so. If his faith is more important than his life, then his choice to choose his faith over his life is a valid one.

In the case of a child, however, it is a much different matter. According to the law (in most Western countries, I can't speak to the world in general), children do not have the legal right to make this kind of choice on their own. Children cannot consent to have sex with an adult, they cannot sign legal documents, etc. Due to the fact that they cannot make these choices on their own, a responsible adult must make the choice for them.

In most cases, this adult will be the child's parents. However, the law recognizes cases where a parent is abusing a child, not feeding a child and other instances where the child's welfare is harmed by the decisions made by the parents. In those cases, the government steps in and protects the the child from his parents. The well-being of the child is more important (from a legal point of view) than the rights of the parent to raise or do to their child what they see fit.

This is no different. By the parents imposing their own religious point of view on a child who (legally speaking) does not have the capacity to form his own decisions and threatening the well-being of that child as a result, the law states unequivocally that they have abdicated the right to make decisions for that child. It is irrelevant whether or not the child would have made the same decision were he able to give legal consent, or whether the parents think that what they're doing is best for the child, the legal position on cases like this is clear.

Some JW's try to muddy the waters by bringing in freedom of religion to the issue, but it's not a relevant point. The point is that a child's well-being is at risk and those who are supposed to be guarding his well-being are not doing so (according to the lagal definition of it). If your religion says that you're allowed to sodomize twelve-year old children, you're still not allowed to do so. If your religion says you're allowed to sodomize consenting twenty-year old adults, then you're allowed to do so.

The point is that they are harming these children and are therefore not fit to make decisions for them. the religious aspect of it is not important.

[Edited for spelling]

[ September 10, 2002: Message edited by: peteyh ]</p>