Children in High Demand Organizations

Health Care

February 14, 2007

The Future is in Our Past

The Beacon - Gander, Newfoundland

http://www.ganderbeacon.ca/
index.cfm?iid=2287&sid=18657

The truth shall set you free?

February 12, 2007

by Audrey Manning

The first case of sextuplets born in Canada occurred in Vancouver on Jan. 6 to Jehovah’s Witness parents.

The Vancouver babies were premature and needed blood transfusions to cope with low volumes of blood. Jehovah's Witnesses believe the Bible says they should abstain from blood (Acts 21:25) and therefore refuse blood transfusions for themselves and their children.

The care of the babies presents an ethical dilemma for the doctors. Medical authorities do not generally have the authority to overrule the parents’ wishes. However, when a child is in danger of dying, the doctors can lodge a complaint with government authorities that can get a court order to enforce treatment.

Religious authorities cite the special relationship between parent and child as something to be fostered and protected because it is the fundamental elemental upon which society and culture is constructed. The big question is: should the state intervene to save the life of a child?

Here we have a conundrum. The same religious authorities who would champion the rights of the unborn and turn every stone to prevent a woman’s right to choose will not go out on a limb for the born, preferring to leave the matter to the courts.

The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada cites three main principles at stake — the rights of parents, respect for religious beliefs and protection of children. In the unborn debate, protection of the unborn is paramount. After the child is born, protection comes after parental and religious rights.

There is an ethical assumption parents should have care and custody of their children because parents love their children and strive to help them to become honourable human beings. This assumption does not stand up to scrutiny. If parents are abusing children, society intervenes to protect the children. The question is: who needs protection more than a child who will die if medical treatment is not administered?

The argument is reduced to: are children individuals with human rights? It seems the only way to protect all children is to make the ethical assumption parents do not own their children. Parents are guardians charged with the task of helping their children to grow physically and emotionally. Life-and-death decisions regarding children should not take into consideration the religious beliefs of the parents.

Parents have rights, but they are not absolute. Outside religious rules, parents can’t make decisions that have the potential to harm their children. Children are regularly taken away from their parents when they’re deemed to be at risk. Thus, while society may accept parents are free to become martyrs, they are not free, in indistinguishable circumstances, to make martyrs of their children.

That parental rights do not give parents life and death authority over their children is especially relevant in the case of Jehovah’s Witnesses. This is because their teachings have changed radically, over the years, with regard to medical treatment.

As well as whole blood, the Watchtower Society used to prohibit taking into the body any of the components that make up whole blood. Over time, while sticking to the banning of whole blood, they have gradually permitted the use of virtually all the components that make up whole blood.

They first sanctioned globulin, then the clotting factors, plasma proteins and finally hemoglobin in June 2000. According to the Watchtower, June 15, 2000, Questions From Readers, essentially every component or fraction derived from whole blood and its primary components are allowed in medical treatment.

Religious authorities often view new technologies with suspicion. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s many religious communities objected to vaccinations. Vaccinations were denounced as harmful and morally wrong. Jehovah’s Witnesses saw vaccination as a direct violation of the everlasting covenant that God made with Noah after the flood (the Golden Age, precursor to the Awake, Feb. 4, 1931).

Between 1967 and 1980, the Watchtower Society and others held a dim view of organ transplants. Major religions, inlcuding Catholicism, Judaism and Islam, issued warnings against transplants. Some religions objected because the procedure involved cutting an organ from a living body. Others, like the Witnesses, viewed transplants as an extension of cannibalism (the Watchtower, Nov. 15, 1967).

In 1980, the Watchtower Society made transplants a matter for personal decision, accepting the procedure as one that saves lives. Until the rules were relaxed, loyal Witnesses chose blindness rather than a corneal transplant and death rather than a kidney transplant.

Some branches of the Jewish and Muslim faiths continue to voice concerns over the rapid advance of medical research. However, religious thinkers have been forced to consider scientific technology when dealing with theological issues. Questions relating to stem-cell research, fertility, contraception and abortion remain the focus of religious debates.

There is no doubt society is conflicted over religious truths. Yet, even the most dogmatic views evolve. Is it reasonable to place the lives of children into this mix of personal beliefs and truths? Is it reasonable to give parents, like the parents of the sextuplets, the power of life and death over their children when their decisions are based on the whim of religious interpretation, which change over time?

Posted by Perry at 05:17 PM

February 06, 2007

The fight for the sextuplets

Macleans.ca
http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/
national/article.jsp?article=
2007_2_5_1170711851

The beliefs of Jehovah's Witnesses come under the microscope in their battle against blood transfusions

by Chris Selley

February 6, 2007

It is common medical knowledge that fertility treatments often result in multiple pregnancies, that multiple pregnancies often result in severely premature birth and that severely premature infants often require blood transfusions.

The behaviour of the British Columbia sextuplets' parents, who are Jehovah's Witnesses, thus represents something of a perfect ethical, religious and medical storm. They likely employed fertility treatments: "Hellin's Law" approximates the odds of naturally born sextuplets at around one in five billion. They refused the common remedy of "multifetal pregnancy reduction" - that is, aborting selected fetuses to improve the prospects of the others. And on religious grounds, they did not consent to the blood transfusions doctors deemed necessary.

Last week, it emerged that the B.C. government had temporarily taken custody of three of the four surviving sextuplets and administered transfusions to two of them. The unidentified parents, who have not spoken to the media, filed an affidavit claiming "immense sadness and grief"; meanwhile their religious group's Canadian chapter released a cryptic statement warning against "stereotypical assumptions regarding Jehovah's Witnesses."

The reaction to the church's handling of the sextuplets' story, though, might have less to do with stereotypes than with perceived contradictions in its official positions.

On fertility treatments, it is willing to look the other way. "The Bible doesn't comment on that subject at all and in Bible times there was no such technology," Witness spokesperson Mark Ruge told the Canadian Press in January. "On matters other than what's stipulated in the Bible, it's up to a person's conscience or their free choice."

On blood transfusions, it's quite a different matter. It's not that the Witnesses claim that blood transfusions were being administered "in Bible times"; rather, their beliefs rely on an apparently unique interpretation of a number of Bible verses.

Among those verses is one in Genesis in which (by the Witnesses' translation) God advises Noah that "[e]very moving animal that is alive may serve as food for YOU. As in the case of green vegetation, I do give it all to YOU. Only flesh with its soul - its blood - YOU must not eat."

In Leviticus, Jehovah offers the following guidelines to Moses: "As for any man of the sons of Israel or some alien resident who is residing as an alien in YOUR midst who in hunting catches a wild beast or a fowl that may be eaten, he must in that case pour its blood out and cover it with dust. For the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood by the soul in it. Consequently I said to the sons of Israel: 'YOU must not eat the blood of any sort of flesh, because the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood. Anyone eating it will be cut off.'"

And in Acts, James advised the apostles to "abstain from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood."

At least one Biblical scholar is willing to opine that the passages have nothing to do with human blood at all. "The way the Jehovah's Witnesses read the biblical text is simply wrong," Professor Michael Duggan of Calgary's St. Mary's University College told the Canadian Press late last week.

"They speak about the life being in the blood, but the blood they are talking about is the blood of animals," he said, arguing that the verses are essentially lessons in basic food hygiene.

Whatever the biblical merits, the legal precedent is certainly there for the sextuplets' parents to be overruled.

In 1995, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on a similar case - that of baby S.B., who was born four weeks premature and whose custody was temporarily awarded to the Toronto Children's Aid Society so that transfusions could be administered.

The judges conceded that the court's actions had deprived S.B.'s parents "of their right to decide which medical treatment should be administered to their infant and in so doing… infringed upon the parental 'liberty' protected in s. 7 of the Charter." But they decided that the infringement was "in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice."

Justices Cory, Iacobucci and Major went further. "While the right to liberty embedded in s. 7… may very well permit parents to choose among equally effective types of medical treatment for their children, it does not include a parents' [sic] right to deny a child medical treatment that has been adjudged necessary by a medical professional and for which there is no legitimate alternative," they argued.

Such an alternative has emerged since, though its legitimacy is not uncontested. "Bloodless medicine" made headlines in 2005 in connection with a 14-year-old Jehovah's Witness from Vernon, B.C., who had been diagnosed with bone cancer. After a B.C. court ordered that she receive blood transfusions if they became necessary as part of her chemotherapy, she and her family petitioned an Ontario court to allow them to seek treatment at a New York hospital that offers transfusion-free treatment; a deal was eventually struck to allow that treatment.

With Witnesses old enough to understand the procedure often comparing blood transfusions to rape, the case of a 14-year-old arguably old enough to make up her own mind left public opinion split. But in the case of the Vancouver sextuplets, it appears to be considerably more one-sided - a recent Ipsos poll finding that 85% of British Columbians agree with the province's course of action.

Not all Witnesses are on board with their church's positions. "There is not uniform acceptance of the Watch Tower's blood doctrine among Jehovah’s Witnesses," the Associated Jehovah's Witnesses for Reform on Blood argues. "The Watch Tower organization promotes a myth when it argues that all Jehovah's Witnesses hold the same conviction on this point of doctrine."

With such reformers having failed to gain much of a foothold, though, it appears the church will go down fighting on the sextuplets.

Posted by Perry at 02:21 PM

February 05, 2007

Biblical scholar says Jehovah's Witnesses wrong about blood transfusions

Body and Health
http://bodyandhealth.canada.com/
channel_health_news_details.asp?
news_id=11662&news_channel_id=
145&channel_id=145&rot=11

Provided by: Canadian Press

Written by: DIRK MEISSNER

Feb. 2, 2007

VICTORIA (CP) - A biblical scholar says he woke up Friday morning convinced he must wade into the blood battle in British Columbia involving four babies, their Jehovah's Witness parents, their church and the government.

Religious scholars have evaded the Jehovah's Witness blood issue because they didn't believe it had academic merit, but it's a story that must be told, said Prof. Michael Duggan, who teaches biblical literature at St. Mary's University College in Calgary.

Duggan said he's been in Alberta hospitals telling doctors his academic perspective on what the Bible says about blood and what many Jehovah's Witnesses believe the biblical scriptures say about blood.

But the message needs to be made more public, he said.

"The point that I make to the physicians is none of these texts has to do with human blood," said Duggan. "Certainly, they never had to do with transfusions."

"What they have to do with is the handling of animals that are slaughtered and the cooking and the procedures in cooking the meat so as to be free of contamination and disease."

Four babies fighting for their survival in a Vancouver hospital are at the centre of a debate about religious freedom and the power of the government to protect its citizens.

The babies are the surviving sextuplets born almost three months' premature in Vancouver last month. Two of the six babies have died.

The parents are Jehovah's Witnesses who say they were horrified when the government seized custody of three of their children and gave two of them blood transfusions, a procedure their religion forbids.

The B.C. government said it was obligated by law to temporarily seize the babies and administer the blood transfusions for health reasons against the wishes of their parents.

Last week, the government took custody of three of the remaining children so doctors could perform transfusions. The government withdrew a seizure order Wednesday and the parents regained custody.

But the government can legally move in again.

The group that speaks for Jehovah's Witnesses in Canada issued a statement that said hospitals in Canada and the United States have treated extremely premature infants without blood transfusions by taking smaller samples of blood and accepting lower hemoglobin levels, among other things.

Premature babies have extremely low blood volumes, are prone to anemia and require frequent blood tests.

When asked why the religious denomination refuses blood transfusions, spokesman Mark Ruge pointed to the Jehovah's Witnesses website.

On it, the organization cites Bible passages to back up the belief. They include Leviticus 17:10-14, which reads in part:

"And whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, that eateth any manner of blood; I will even set my face against that soul that eateth blood, and will cut him off from among his people."

The group also cites Acts 15:19-20, which states that God's followers must "abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood."

Duggan said the blood passages in the Hebrew Bible - Old Testament - often cited by Jehovah's Witnesses as their reasons to refuse blood transfusions are safe cooking instructions that date back to the 5th Century.

"That needs to be said," Duggan said. "The way the Jehovah's Witnesses read the biblical text is simply wrong."

The texts in the Hebrew Bible are mainly taken from Genesis 9:4-6 and from the book of Leviticus 17, he said.

"They speak about the life being in the blood, but the blood they are talking about is the blood of animals," Duggan said.

The case of the British Columbia sextuplets and other similar blood tranfusion battles in Alberta have him wanting to take on the Jehovah's Witnesses academically.

"I'm just concerned that people don't get victimized any more by this," Duggan said. "I mean this is life and death for people."

"It means I've got to write this article," he said. "As absurd as it seems to me to say this, I really do. I got up this morning realizing I have to do this."

A former Jehovah's Witness said the blood ban isn't always as strict as it appears.

Kerry Louderback-Wood, whose Jehovah's Witness mother died of a heart attack after refusing a blood transfusion late in her life, said the blood policy has shifted over the years.

Organ transplants weren't allowed in the 1960s, but they are now, she said.

Louderback-Wood, from Fort Myers, Florida, said the lives of the Vancouver babies should not be put at risk for a religious doctrine that has changed over the years and could likely change again.

Posted by Perry at 03:50 PM

February 03, 2007

Jehovah's Witnesses Battle Blood Transfusions in Canadian Hospital

Religion News Service
http://www.beliefnet.com/
story/211/story_21120_1.html

By Ron Csillag

TORONTO, Feb 1 - A clash between religious beliefs and the government's responsibility to protect children is playing out in a Vancouver hospital, where government officials have seized the babies of a Jehovah's Witness couple in order to give them blood transfusions.

The drama began Jan. 7, when six premature babies were born to parents who are devout Jehovah's Witnesses. Two of the six babies have since died.

Doctors warned that the remaining babies would likely need life-saving blood transfusions, a procedure that is forbidden for Witnesses.

Social workers from the British Columbia government seized three of the remaining four babies last weekend, just long enough to give two of them blood transfusions, over their parents' objections.

On Tuesday (Jan. 30), a lawyer for the parents appeared in court ready to appeal the government's decision to seize the children, only to find that officials had already returned the children to the parents' care.

The three seized babies remain in the neonatal ward at Women's and Children's Hospital. All four remaining babies are in stable condition.

The parents, who have not been identified, have filed a court action requesting a hearing before the Supreme Court of British Columbia to challenge the province's conduct. A hearing is set for Feb. 23.

"The family appealed what the government did and has brought an application for judicial review, saying that the government violated what the Supreme Court of Canada said 10 years ago," the parents' lawyer, Shane Brady, told Canadian Press.

Canada's Supreme Court ruled in 1995 that a child's right to essential medical care trumps a parent's right to religious expression.

But the ruling also gave parents the right to present evidence at a hearing in such matters.

In an affidavit filed by the father, the parents quote Scriptures that Jehovah's Witnesses say forbid them from having blood transfusions.

"What the government did is wrong," Brady said. "The father described it to me like this -- it's a hit and run."

The parents have said they would not oppose "alternative medical treatments" for their children.

"Our obligation to protect children is paramount," said British Columbia's Children and Families Minister Tom Christensen, who said he could not discuss details of this case.

Posted by Perry at 04:33 PM

Father recalls breaking with faith for daughter

Globe and Mail
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
servlet/story/LAC.20070202.
BCTUPLET02/TPStory/National

02/02/07

PATRICK BRETHOUR

VANCOUVER -- Lawrence Hughes walked into a Calgary hospital room in February, 2002, with a Bible in his hand, ready to do everything he could for his dying daughter, Bethany -- everything, that is, short of allowing her to have a lifesaving blood transfusion.

Mr. Hughes, who had been a Jehovah's Witness for two decades, was determined to fulfill his faith, which holds that Scripture prohibits blood transfusions. He entered the hospital room, where his daughter lay with leukemia, believing that his only option was to give her comfort in her final days.

"As far as I was concerned, my daughter was going to die, and I was willing to let her die, just like all these other Jehovah's Witness parents," he said.

But as he thumbed through his Bible, reading passages aloud to Bethany, his conviction evaporated. His copy of the Bible had an index, pointing out scriptural references that underpinned beliefs of the Jehovah Witnesses, including the prohibition on blood transfusion. He recalled reading recommended passages in turn, as he sat by Bethany's deathbed, and then rejecting it as not speaking to his 16-year-old daughter's plight.

Eventually, he searched for other scriptural references -- not listed in the index -- that seemed to confirm that he should permit the transfusion, allowing Bethany to live. By the time he left the room, he had broken with two decades of belief, setting him on a collision course with his church, wife and friends.

The parents of Vancouver's sextuplets, only four of whom remain alive, have not voiced any similar doubts about the court action that has allowed the B.C. government to transfuse blood into three infants.

Indeed, in a court filing, the father of the sextuplets professes both his love for his children and his family's determination to stand by his beliefs.

"We owe our lives and the lives of our children to our Creator. . . . We are not willing to turn our backs on Him now."

Mr. Hughes is just as adamant that the prohibition against transfusions is counter to what he believes.

"They go against God-given instincts to protect your children, and let your children die," he said, recalling that the reaction from other members of the Jehovah's Witnesses to his change of heart five years ago was fierce and immediate. "I was called an apostate," he said. "It's someone who's working against Jehovah, and for Satan. You're not supposed to talk to that person."

Bethany did not want a transfusion, but the Alberta government successfully argued that she was not mature enough to make decisions about treatment. Mr. Hughes said his daughter rallied after receiving 38 transfusions, but the teen died in September, 2002.

He sued the Jehovah's Witness organization, but that suit was dismissed last year by the Alberta Court of Queen's Bench.

Posted by Perry at 04:29 PM

B.C., parents tussle over sextuplets

Calgary Sun
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2007/02/01/3499047-cp.html

February 1, 2007

By SCOTT SUTHERLAND AND DIRK MEISSNER

VICTORIA (CP) - Four babies are struggling to live while a furious debate rages outside their hospital room about religious freedom and the power of the state to protect its citizens.

The four babies are the survivors of Vancouver sextuplets born last month almost three months premature. The parents are Jehovah's Witnesses who say they were horrified when the government seized custody of three of them and gave two blood transfusions, a procedure their religion forbids.

The B.C. government said it was obligated by law to temporarily seize the babies and administer the blood transfusions for health reasons against the wishes of their parents.

It's gut-wrenching, emotion-churning territory, all while the lives of four children hang in the balance, says Dr. Juliet Guichon, a medical ethicist at the University of Calgary who has monitored other clashes between Jehovah's Witnesses and government.

But the blood battle has the potential to end happily for the parents and their babies, she said.

Ironically, it all depends on how hard they fight the government.

"(It) could be seen as liberating because it takes the parents out of an impossible social situation," said Guichon.

The parents, who risk being shunned for life by the church because their children received the transfusions, can now plead they abided by the blood ban, but couldn't stop the government, she said.

"They can hold their head up among the Jehovah's Witness community and say, 'We protested, we went to court."'

The church and the parents know deep down the government will step in to save the children, even if it means blood transfusions, Guichon said.

Two medical experts helped advise the B.C. government to seize the children.

The Canadian Press has learned the government used the medical experts' advice to apply a section of the B.C. Child, Family and Community Service Act in taking custody of the children.

Section 30 allowed the government to act before the parents had a hearing, even though one was scheduled for later this month.

That section says the province's regional director of child welfare doesn't need a court order to move in as long as there are "reasonable grounds" to believe the child's health or safety is in immediate danger.

"(My wife) and I could not bear to be at the hospital while they were violating our little girl," the father of the sextuplets said in a court affidavit.

"We took our immense sadness and grief and tried to console each other in private."

The parents, who cannot be identified under a court order, have refused to speak to the media since their children were born in the first week of January almost three months premature.

Two of the sextuplets have since died and the rest have remained in hospital.

Last Friday, the government took custody of three of the remaining children and the blood transfusions were done. On Wednesday, the government withdrew the seizure order and the parents regained custody.

However, the act allows the province to move in once again if the circumstances are repeated.

The group that speaks for the Christian sect in Canada was inundated with calls Thursday from reporters wanting to know its response to the current controversy and seeking clarification on why Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions.

The release also said hospitals in Canada and the United States have treated extremely premature infants without blood transfusions by taking smaller samples of blood and accepting lower hemoglobin levels, among other things.

"It is important for the media and others to avoid making stereotypical assumptions regarding Jehovah's Witnesses," the statement said.

When asked why the sect refuses blood transfusions, spokesman Mark Ruge directed reporters to the Jehovah's Witnesses website.

On it, the group cites Bible passages to back up their belief. They include Leviticus 17:10-14, which reads in part:

"And whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, that eateth any manner of blood; I will even set my face against that soul that eateth blood, and will cut him off from among his people."

The group also cites Acts 15:19-20, which states that God's followers must "abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood."

But Jehovah's Witnesses are not barred from receiving organ transplants or from using blood products.

"Since the Bible makes no clear statement about the use of minor blood fractions or the immediate reinfusion of a patient's own blood during surgery, a medical process known as blood salvaging, the use of such treatments is a matter of personal choice," the site says.

Similarly, the faith has no problem with vaccines, some of which contain blood products.

A former Jehovah's Witness said the blood ban isn't always as strict as it appears.

"The word is symantics," said Kerry Louderback-Wood, of Fort Myers, Florida.

"A rose by another name smells sweeter. On one hand, we do not take blood in any form. On the other hand, 'Oh, you can have albumen, hemoglobin, by personal decision."'

Louderback-Wood, 38 and almost nine months pregnant, said her mother died of a heart attack after she refused a blood transfusion late in her life.

Earlier in her life, she accepted blood after hemorrhaging while giving birth to one of her children, she said.

Louderback-Wood said she remembers her mother telling her there were some things in life that should be kept from the church.

She said she quit being a Jehovah's Witness in her teens when she realized her university aspirations would be frowned on by the church.

She said in a later e-mail that Jehovah's Witness doctrine has shifted over the years. For example, she said in the 1960s, organ transplants weren't allowed, but they are now.

"What's sad is think of all the people who died or came down with polio/other diseases because of these bans that were later lifted.

"Why should the baby's die, when Jehovah may change his stance on blood in the future."

Posted by Perry at 04:27 PM

Jehovah's Witnesses say they seek 'best treatment'

Canadian Press
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/
Canada/2007/02/01/3499047-cp.html

February 1, 2007

VICTORIA (CP) - The group that speaks for Jehovah's Witnesses in Canada has issued a statement urging people not to jump to conclusions about their faith.

The sect's prohibition on blood transfusions is again in the spotlight after the B.C. government seized three infant sextuplets and gave them blood transfusions against the wishes of their Jehovah's Witness parents.

But Jehovah's Witnesses Canada says in a media statement that even an Alberta judge has concluded people shouldn't assume parents are always wrong in refusing transfusions.

The release also says hospitals in Canada and the United States have treated extremely premature infants without blood transfusions by taking smaller samples of blood and accepting lower hemoglobin levels, among other things.

The remaining sextuplets are back in the custody of their parents after the B.C. government abruptly withdrew the seizure order Wednesday.

Their parents, who cannot be named, said in a court affidavit that the seizure and blood transfusions were "violating."

Posted by Perry at 04:24 PM

Why Jehovah's Witnesses Refuse Blood Transfusions

From the Blog of Danny Haszard, a lifelong 3rd generation Jehovah's
http://www.progressiveu.org/
214852-jehovahs-witnesses-
blood-transfusions

The real deal on why Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions.

Jehovah's Witnesses have a non negotiable doctrine of their belief system to reject blood products.

The origin of this dogma comes from their founding father Joseph Rutherford in the early 20th century.The consumption (eating) of blood was strictly forbidden under old testament kosher law.

The Watchtower leadership of Jehovah's Witnesses saw fit to extend this prohibition over to their belief system.

They thought that the "end of the world" was coming back then (ca.1940) so there would never be much causality.

It is well into the 21st century,with the "end of the world" on hold,the Watchtower leaders have blood on their hands,with the deaths of innocent minor children.

Many children have died since rejecting life saving blood transfusions.Why do they maintain adherence to this archaic creed at all cost?
Answer:The man-made Watchtower cult is run by lawyers who know they would be sued out of existence for wrongful death suits,if they dared to outright repeal the bogus no blood ruling now.

UPDATE:The absurdity of the Watchtower rulings now allow any of the COMPONENTS of blood to be transfused, but not whole blood, and yet people are dying and lives and families are being ruined over a few old men who are always changing their minds on this matter.

Some educational links provided below:

http://www.ajwrb.org/
Jehovah Witness blood policy reform site

http://www.towertotruth.net/
Articles/blood_transfusions.htm
Will you die for a lie?

(Jehovah's Witnesses do use many products that are derived from blood banks (so called blood 'fractions') but they themselves won't donate a drop)

--------

Posted by Perry at 04:08 PM

B.C. seized surviving sextuplets for blood transfusions

CanWest News Service
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
news/story.html?id=c5ef3a1a-c9c4-
4908-8cad-c60e459d9114&k=96571

Published: Wednesday, January 31, 2007

VICTORIA — The B.C. government took custody of three of four surviving sextuplets over the weekend from a Jehovah’s Witness family, believing the infants were in danger if they didn’t get blood transfusions, the family’s lawyer revealed Wednesday.

The family has since regained custody after two or three of the four babies were given transfusions. Such medical intervention is prohibited under the Jehovah’s Witness faith.

But the anonymous family, which has avoided the media since the sextuplets’ births, went to court Wednesday and was given a chance in late February to argue their rights have been violated, said lawyer Shane Brady, who also confirmed two of the six babies born overnight Jan. 6-7 have since died.

A Supreme Court of Canada decision a decade ago ruled a family had to be consulted before such government intervention, something the government did not do, he alleged.

Claiming it is bound by privacy laws, the B.C. government would not confirm the action or details of the case.

B.C. Children’s Minister Tom Christensen only said the government is bound by law to act in the interest of children.

"What I can tell you is that the ministry’s obligation any time we find that there’s a child in need of protection for any reason, including the need for medical treatment, the ministry will look at the situation and determine whether there’s action we need to take to ensure that the child is protected. That is the policy we follow."

The four boys and two girls — each weighing only 1.8 pounds — were born at 25 weeks, just over the half-way mark of an average 40-week pregnancy.

Posted by Perry at 04:04 PM

Blood transfusions

Vancouver Sun
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
news/story.html?id=eb8ebdba-d88b
-4a26-ae49-bc0557b23c3a

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Why some people refused to have blood transfusions:

- Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions for religious reasons. According to the website www.watchtower.com, Jehovah's Witnesses view life as God's gift represented by blood. They believe the Bible's command that Christians must "abstain from blood." (Acts 15:28, 29).

- In 2001, 16-year-old Bethany Hughes of Calgary made headlines nationwide after refusing to undergo blood transfusions because of her strong Jehovah's Witnesses faith. Hughes died in September 2002, of leukemia after an unsuccessful court battle to refuse 38 transfusions.

- In 2003, 20-year-old Candice Unland of Morinville, Alta. tried unsuccessfully to challenge legislation that says a patient 18 years or older has the right to refuse a transfusion. Unland argued that a mature 16-year-old, such as Hughes, should also have the same right. The case was rejected by the Supreme Court of Canada.

- In 2005, a B.C. Supreme Court judge ruled against the right of a 14-year-old Jehovah's Witness from Vernon to refuse life-saving blood transfusions. The girl was suffering from a potentially fatal form of bone cancer. In her ruling, Justice Mary Boyd said the rights of a "mature minor" to make her own medical choices do not supercede the authority of the courts in British Columbia to protect her life and safety.

Posted by Perry at 04:01 PM

Le gouvernement a pris à sa charge trois des sextuplés

Presse Canadienne (PC)
http://www2.canoe.com/infos/
quebeccanada/archives/2007/01/
20070131-220826.html

Steve Mertl

31/01/2007

Le gouvernement de Colombie-Britannique a pris à sa charge trois des sextuplés la semaine dernière afin que les médecins leur donnent des transfusions sanguines, contre la volonté de leurs parents.

L'avocat de la famille a indiqué que le geste du gouvernement va à l'encontre de décisions de la Cour suprême et a dit que la famille était très bouleversée. Deux des sextuplés sont morts. La naissance des six poupons, au début de janvier, était prématurée de trois mois.

À leur naissance, les parents ne voulaient pas que l'hôpital ne divulgue aucun détail, mais ils ont autorisé les autorités à préciser qu'ils étaient Témoins de Jéhovah. Cette religion interdit les transfusions. Les parents ont indiqué expressément qu'ils refusaient cette procédure.

Au dire de l'avocat de la famille, Shane Brady, ils étaient à la recherche d'un traitement alternatif. Il a ajouté que l'état des enfants était stable et que les transfusions étaient plus ou moins nécessaires.

Selon l'avocat, «la famille est très bouleversée par la façon dont le gouvernement l'a traitée. C'est comme un délit de fuite».

L'avocat a a plaidé à la Cour suprême de la Colombie-Britannique mercredi pour s'opposer à l'ordonnance de prise en charge, qui a été soudainement retirée par le gouvernement.

Shane Brady a précisé que les autorités avaient remis les trois bébés.

Mais les parents, qui ne peuvent être identifiés en vertu d'une ordonnance de la cour, persistent et veulent en appeler de l'ordonnance de prise en charge. La cour entendra la cause les 22 et 23 février.

Le ministre provincial des Enfants et des Familles, Tom Chrsitensen, a refusé de commenter. Mais il a ajouté que les médecins avaient l'obligation de signaler aux autorités du ministère les cas où ils estiment que des enfants sont en danger.

En 1995, la Cour suprême avait tranché que les parents avaient le droit de présenter des éléments de preuve dans de tels litiges. En 1999, la cour avait réitéré qu'il s'agissait d'un droit fondamental dans la société canadienne.

Posted by Perry at 03:58 PM

Sextuplet parents take B.C. to court over baby seizures

CBC News
http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/
2007/02/01/sextuplet-
transfusion-070201.html

Claim government violated religious rights by giving newborns blood transfusions

Thursday, February 1, 2007

The Vancouver parents of sextuplets born in January are now in a legal battle with the province, claiming the government violated their religious rights when social workers seized three of their newborns to give them blood transfusions.

The parents, both Jehovah's Witnesses, argue the province had no right to step in against their wishes to take temporary custody of three of their four surviving sextuplets.

B.C.'s director of child protection seized one child on a Jan. 26 order under provincial child-care legislation. An order for a second child was sought the following day and a third on Monday.

Two blood transfusions were done, and the babies were returned to the custody of their parents on Wednesday.

The couple says their constitutional rights were disregarded because, as Jehovah's Witnesses, they oppose any treatment involving blood transfusions.

In a motion filed to block future seizures of the babies, the parents, who can't be named under a publication ban, issued their first public statement:
"[My wife] and I deeply love our babies and want them to live. We continue to be heartbroken about the death of [two of them]," the husband wrote in an affidavit. "We will not, however, consent to blood transfusions. We firmly believe that our creator commands us in scriptures, such as Acts 15:28-29 to abstain from blood products."

Court documents show the parents had a strained relationship with the doctors assisting the birthing process and that the father repeatedly rejected suggestions from medical experts that aborting two of the fetuses could give the remaining four a better chance of living.
Two newborns already dead

Two of the sextuplets — Canada's first ever — died soon after being born at the B.C. Women's Hospital and Health Centre on Jan. 5 and 6. All of the babies were 15 weeks premature and weighed less than 2.2 pounds each.

B.C. Minister of Children and family Services Tom Christensen made it clear that regardless of a family's religious affiliation, "the obligation is to ensure that a child in need of protection … gets the treatment required," even if that means the ministry must step in.

But Shane Brady, the lawyer representing the family, said the government must first give the parents a fair hearing, which the parents never received.

"They are very frustrated and deeply hurt by this unwarranted interference in this very difficult and challenging part of their children's treatment," Brady said of the parents.

The parents will be back in court in late February, when they will demand a government apology for violating their religious freedoms, and then try to persuade the court to end the possibility of future seizures.

Posted by Perry at 03:49 PM

January 29, 2007

Parents fight newborn blood testing

Lawrence Journal-World
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2007/jan/28/
parents_fight_newborn_blood_testing/

By Anna Jo Bratton - Associated Press Writer

January 28, 2007

Wahoo, Neb. — Ray and Louise Spiering wanted to observe a period of silence after their daughter Melynda’s birth, but what they got was an uproar.

To the Spierings, Nebraska’s requirement that newborn babies undergo blood screening within 48 hours of birth is an infringement on their religious beliefs and their right to decide what’s best for their four children.

The couple attend a fundamentalist Christian church and follow some teachings of the Church of Scientology. Louise Spiering said they wanted “that balance of our beliefs included into the births of our children.”

It’s taken them and another set of parents to the Nebraska Supreme Court and the Legislature in a drive to make the newborn screening law more flexible.

The mandatory test, in which a few drops of blood are drawn from a baby’s heel, screens for dozens of rare congenital diseases, some of which can cause severe mental retardation or death if left undetected.

Nebraska is one of four states — along with South Dakota, Michigan and Montana — that don’t let parents opt out of the testing.

The Spierings wanted to avoid loud noises after Melynda’s birth, and also reduce the pain she experienced in order to protect her physical and mental health. The concept comes from the Church of Scientology — minimizing talking around someone who is in pain, said the Rev. Brian Fesler of Minneapolis, a regional representative for the church.

The church teaches that words spoken during moments of pain and unconsciousness affect physical and mental health later in life, he said. The church encourages silent birth, in which those attending avoid talking.

But the church doesn’t discourage parents from having their children tested, Fesler said.

The Spierings, who apply some tenets of Scientology to their faith, took the silent birth concept a step further. They believe newborns are in pain for at least 3 1/2 days, and don’t want blood drawn — which they believe would cause more pain — for at least that long.

They asked for seven days to complete the testing to avoid any unforeseen problems, although they would have preferred to skip the test altogether.

The state insisted, and in September a federal judge upheld the law as constitutional. The judge, however, granted the Spierings an eight-day waiting period while the case was pending, so their daughter was not tested within 48 hours.

Armed with a petition including about 100 signatures, Louise Spiering testified Thursday before the Legislature’s Health and Human Services committee.

Health officials testified that the requirement is one of the state’s most cost-effective public health programs.

“Some parents may not comprehend the risks they are taking with their children’s health,” said Bruce Rieker of the Nebraska Hospital Association.

Many of the diseases covered in the bill are deficiencies, and one, phenylketonuria, can result in severe mental retardation without diet restrictions starting at birth.

Posted by Perry at 05:36 PM

January 17, 2007

Sextuplets are born into a religious debate

Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/
asection/la-fg-sextuplets17jan17,1,5664111.
story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=1&cset=true

The premature babies may need blood transfusions to survive. But their parents' faith prohibits such treatments.

By Maggie Farley, Times Staff Writer
January 17, 2007

OTTAWA — Canada's first sextuplets, born more than a week ago, are facing an additional complication to the usual premature baby's struggle for survival: Their parents' religion forbids blood transfusions, a typical part of a preemie's treatment.

The babies' condition remains a mystery, and the hospital refuses to confirm reports that one infant has died.

The six babies were born Jan. 5 and 6 in Vancouver, British Columbia, to parents who are Jehovah's Witnesses. Delivered at 25 weeks, more than halfway through the typical 40-week pregnancy, the four boys and two girls averaged 1.6 pounds and can rest in the palm of an average man's hand. The survival rate for such births is about 80%.

The parents have asked to remain anonymous, and the hospital has not provided information since shortly after the births, when a spokesman reported that the babies were in fair condition.

On Tuesday, hospital officials would not comment on a media report citing sources in the hospital that one of the boys had died.

"The family asks that their privacy be respected," said a spokeswoman for B.C. Women's Hospital in Vancouver. "They haven't provided instructions for releasing a statement."

The news of Canada's first sextuplets and the role of the parents' religion in their children's chances for survival have riveted a nation that prides itself on tolerance.

The infants face months in intensive care as their nascent organs, muscles and immunities develop enough for them to live on their own. Blood transfusions are a typical part of a preemie's treatment, experts say, because of their low blood volume and vulnerability to anemia. They also must have their blood drawn repeatedly for tests.

Although Jehovah's Witnesses can receive almost any medical intervention, including fertility treatments, organ transplants and vaccinations, the religion's interpretation of the Bible prohibits blood transfusions.

A passage in the Bible cited as the basis for the prohibition is from Leviticus: "And you must not eat any blood in any places where you dwell, whether that of fowl or that of beast. Any soul who eats any blood, that soul must be cut off from his people."

The prohibition probably was meant to prevent the contamination of water supplies, wrote religious scholar Michael Duggan of St. Mary's University College in Calgary, Alberta. But the religion, which uses 1st century Christianity as its model, has interpreted it literally to forbid the "consumption" or spilling of blood.

Mark Ruge, spokesman for the Jehovah's Witnesses in Canada, said, "It mentions in the Bible to abstain from blood, and so we follow that. We want the best for the children, but without blood."

Asked about the consequences of accepting a transfusion, Ruge said that those who did not follow the Bible's teachings would no longer be Jehovah's Witnesses "by their own accord."

Canada's child protection laws ensure that babies get the medical treatment necessary to keep them alive, even if it takes a court order.

A 1995 decision by Canada's Supreme Court in a similar case of a premature baby born to a Jehovah's Witnesses couple concluded that the infant's medical interests trumped the parents' religious rights.

Neither Vancouver's Child Welfare Department nor the hospital have applied for a court order, a provincial court official said.

Even if they don't have a choice, the parents face a conundrum. If they accept blood transfusions to save the babies' lives, it could cut them off from their religious community at a time when they needed its support.

When Lawrence Hughes, 56, was a Jehovah's Witness, he faced a similar problem. In 2002, his 16-year-old daughter, Bethany, needed blood transfusions as part of her treatment for leukemia. His wife, daughter and the Jehovah's Witnesses community in Calgary opposed the transfusions. After much struggle, he signed the consent forms, and was cut off from his family and congregation.

Jehovah's Witnesses typically live and pray together and discourage association with people outside the congregation.

"I was completely isolated," Hughes said.

After Bethany had 38 transfusions, her mother took her into hiding, and the girl eventually died. Hughes is suing the Jehovah's Witnesses, claiming the lawyers who fought the forced treatments did not act in his daughter's best interests.

"I knew that once I signed the consent form, that was it. I knew I'd lose my family, my friends and my faith," he said. "I did it to try to save my daughter, but I lost her too."

Hughes, who works at an architectural firm in Calgary, has joined with other former Jehovah's Witnesses and dissenters in the church to seek a change in policy regarding blood transfusions. In recent years, the religion has allowed patients to receive what it calls "fractions," or components of blood, but not whole blood.

The prohibition presents a problem for doctors as well, said Juliet Guichon, a medical bioethicist at the University of Calgary.

"The consequences of refusing blood in certain situations are fatal," Guichon said in a telephone interview. "There must be something to make people choose that. If it's coercion or fear, the physician must be aware of that."

maggie.farley@latimes.com

Posted by Perry at 02:41 PM

January 15, 2007

Witness's refusal of transfusion costs his life

The Montreal Gazette
http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/
news/montreal/story.html?id=e2a8aa3e-
af52-4381-9d4c-c3fb7d0fe922&k=15147

CP - January 14, 2007

A young Jehovah's Witness's decision to refuse a blood transfusion - which eventually led to his death - has split his family along religious lines.

Jean-Claude Lavoie, 26, died in late December after refusing a transfusion while being treated for an intestinal tumour, the TQS television network reported Friday.

Lavoie's brother, who is a former Jehovah's Witness, has since launched an Internet petition calling on the federal government to make it illegal for a person to refuse treatment on religious grounds.

"The Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions for religious reasons," Jonathan Lavoie writes on the petition's website.

"This creates enormous stress for the family."

Jonathan maintains that his brother would still be alive if he had received a transfusion.

But Jean-Claude's father told TQS he is willing to accept his son's decision.

"At the beginning it was anticipated that in his case they would be able to operate without a transfusion, but there were complications," Jocelyn Lavoie said. "It's unfortunate, but it came to that.

"It's important to respect Jean-Claude's choice."

As many as 1,000 people have signed Jonathan Lavoie's petition so far.

Posted by Perry at 04:21 PM

Witnesses play down transfusions for premature sextuplets

Vancouver Sun
http://www.canada.com/topics/news/
national/story.html?id=fcbed172-
f4b3-4d3e-8dc0-1fa34a2c959c&k=1815

Randy Shore, with files from Pamela Fayerman, CanWest News Service

Thursday, January 11, 2007

VANCOUVER - The Jehovah's Witnesses national organization issued a statement Wednesday in an attempt to quell widespread media speculation about the medical treatment of sextuplets born prematurely to a woman at B.C. Women's Hospital.

''Discussions about treatment are private matters between the parents and their treating medical team,'' it reads.

The brief text states that church members are allowed to receive any modern medical intervention, except blood transfusions. Several alternative treatments have been employed successfully in the treatment of premature infants, it says, including minimizing blood sampling, and using the hormone erythropoietin and iron to stimulate production of red blood cells.

Neonatologists say blood transfusions are routine for infants of 25-week gestational age. Transfusions are used to treat anemia and jaundice and may also be needed because premature babies have very low blood volume and hospital staff need to draw blood regularly to monitor the infants' health.

The Jehovah's Witnesses statement was released after front-page stories in national and Vancouver newspapers Wednesday indicating the issue of the babies' treatment may end up in court because of the blood-transfusion ban.

Church spokesman Mark Ruge said the statement was issued as a response to the stories, and that it's premature to speculate about the need for medical and legal intervention.

''It is important for the media and others to avoid making stereotypical assumptions regarding Jehovah's Witnesses,'' the statement said.

It also quotes from a 2004 ruling by the Alberta Court of Queen's Bench that it says directs governments and the courts to avoid the assumption that ''the doctor has always recommended the only acceptable treatment'' and that patients are ''always wrong'' to refuse transfusions.

Matt Gordon, spokesman for the Ministry of Children and Family Development, would not say whether the ministry has had any contact with staff or administrators at B.C. Women's Hospital about the sextuplets. But he said that if health care workers believe a child's health is at risk because a parent has refused to consent to treatment recommended by a doctor, they have a legal duty tell a child protection worker.

At that point, he said, the ministry would take steps to ensure a child's safety, which might include seeking a court order to allow treatment or, in cases where quick action is needed to preserve life or prevent permanent harm, taking immediate temporary custody of the child.

The B.C. government has previously used the courts to attempt to force minors to undergo potentially life-saving procedures.

A Jehovah's Witness teenager was ordered by the B.C. Supreme Court to undergo blood transfusions as part of her cancer treatment in 2005. The court said that because the girl, then 14, was a minor, she could not refuse transfusions if doctors deemed them medically necessary.

She fled to Ontario and eventually received bloodless treatment in New York after the B.C. government negotiated a deal with her family for her transfer to Schneider Children's Hospital, which specializes in ''blood avoidance'' treatment.

rshore@png.canwest.com

Posted by Perry at 02:59 PM

Un homme se bat pour faire interdire le refus de traitements médicaux

Taïeb Moalla
Journal de Québec
http://www2.canoe.com/infos/societe/
archives/2007/01/20070113-083201.html

13/01/2007

Depuis la mort de son frère cadet, Jonathan Lavoie se bat pour que les deux paliers de gouvernement rendent illégal le refus des traitements médicaux.

Jean-Claude Lavoie, Témoin de Jéhovah de 26 ans, est mort le 27 décembre dernier. Admis d'urgence à la fin octobre 2006 à l'hôpital Saint-François d'Assise pour une tumeur à l'intestin, son taux d'hémoglobine a rapidement chuté. Au nom de ses convictions religieuses, et passant outre aux conseils des médecins, il a refusé les transfusions sanguines.

«J'ai demandé à lui administrer moi-même la transfusion quitte à faire ensuite de la prison. Mais on me l'a refusé», regrette Jonathan Lavoie.

Selon ses dires, certaines infirmières se sont portées volontaires pour réaliser l'opération. Les autorités de l'hôpital s'y seraient catégoriquement opposées arguant que le personnel médical ne peut légalement pas forcer un adulte averti à recevoir des traitements.

Jonathan Lavoie, 32 ans, a lui-même été Témoin de Jéhovah entre l'âge de huit et 17 ans. Rencontré par le Journal, le jeune homme a décrit un univers d'embrigadement impitoyable.

«Ils nous entraînent pendant des milliers d'heures pour que nous connaissions les failles des gens dès qu'ils ouvrent les portes de leur maison», a relaté M. Lavoie à propos des Témoins de Jéhovah.

C'est pour éviter d'autres pertes de vie «inutiles» que Jonathan Lavoie a lancé une pétition sur Internet au www.primovivere.org (La vie d'abord). Les signataires demandent au gouvernement «que le droit à la vie (soit) plus grand que le droit de pratiquer la religion de son choix».

Accommodement déraisonnable

Dénonçant un «accommodement religieux déraisonnable», Jonathan Lavoie s'est confié au réseau TQS, mercredi dernier, pour lancer un débat de société sur cette épineuse question.

Le problème des transfusions a refait surface à Vancouver, la semaine dernière. Au nom de leur appartenance aux Témoins de Jéhovah, les parents de sextuplés nés prématurément ont refusé que leurs bébés reçoivent des transfusions sanguines. S'il estime que la vie de ces enfants est menacée, le gouvernement de la Colombie-Britannique pourrait prendre des dispositions légales pour ordonner ces transfusions. Au nom de la protection des mineurs, les lois provinciales permettent de soustraire les enfants de l'autorités de leurs parents.

La Salle du Royaume des Témoins de Jéhovah, à Québec, n'a pas retourné l'appel au Journal.

Posted by Perry at 02:57 PM

January 12, 2007

Transfusion refusée : décès d’un Témoin de Jéhovah

Presse Canadienne
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/article/
20070112/CPACTUALITES/70112066/
5025/CPDMINUTE

Le vendredi 12 janvier 2007

Québec

Un jeune Témoin de Jéhovah de Québec, Jean-Claude Lavoie, est décédé durant le temps des Fêtes après avoir refusé une transfusion sanguine pour des motifs religieux.

M. Lavoie, qui était âgé de 26 ans, souffrait d'une tumeur à l'intestin. Son taux d'hémoglobine avait rapidement chuté mais malgré les conseils des médecins, il aurait refusé des transfusions sanguines qui auraient pu lui être salutaires.

Outré, son frère aîné, un ex-témoin de Jéhovah, a confié au réseau de télévision TQS qu'il avait lancé une pétition sur le web pour que les gouvernements rendent illégaux les refus de traitement pour des raisons religieuses.

Les médecins ne peuvent légalement forcer un adulte à recevoir des traitements.

Posted by Perry at 03:40 PM

Les sextuplés suscitent un débat éthique

La Presse
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/article/
20070112/CPACTUALITES/701120692/
5155/CPACTUALITES

Le vendredi 12 janvier 2007

Émilie Côté

Comme la majorité des bébés prématurés de 25 semaines, les sextuplés nés à Vancouver le week-end dernier pourraient avoir besoin de transfusions sanguines. Depuis trois jours, cela suscite un débat éthique, car leurs parents sont des Témoins de Jéhovah.

Avant-hier, le gouvernement de la Colombie-Britannique s'est dit prêt à prendre les dispositions légales pour que la survie des six bébés ne soit pas menacée.

De son côté, la communauté des Témoins de Jéhovah demande au public d'éviter les «présomptions stéréotypées» au sujet de ses membres. Dans un communiqué, le porte-parole Mark Ruge rappelle l'interdiction faite à ses coreligionnaires de «s'abstenir de sang».

Mark Ruge fait valoir que des hôpitaux canadiens et américains ont des options aux transfusions sanguines dans le traitement des grands prématurés.

Les sextuplés une première canadienne sont sortis du ventre de leur mère après seulement 25 semaines de gestation. Les quatre garçons et les deux filles pesaient entre 700 et 800 grammes. Lundi, l'obstétricien Timothy Rowe s'est dit préoccupé par leurs chances de survie. Plusieurs experts ont affirmé que les poupons risquaient d'avoir besoin de transfusions. «plus le bébé est prématuré, plus le besoin d'une transfusion augmente, confirme le Dr Nabeel Ali, néonatalogiste au Centre universitaire de santé McGill (CUSM). On peut sauver des bébés à partir de 23-24 semaines de gestation. À 25 semaines, on parle encore de bébés extrêmement prématurés. La majorité auront besoin d'une transfusion durant leur hospitalisation.»

Depuis la naissance des sextuplés, leurs parents ont préféré rester anonymes, à l'abri des caméras. Hier, la communauté des Témoins de Jéhovah a demandé que leur voeu soit respecté. «Le choix d'un traitement et les discussions à ce sujet sont une affaire privée entre les parents et l'équipe médicale», indique le communiqué.

David Roy, directeur du Centre de bioéthique de l'Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM), partage cet avis.

Toutefois, cette naissance soulève plusieurs préoccupations éthiques, souligne le bioéthicien. «Celles des médecins, de la société, des parents et des Témoins de Jéhovah. C'est important de protéger les parents des différentes pressions exercées sur eux.» Tout le débat à savoir s'il faut donner une transfusion sanguine à un bébé né de parents Témoins de Jéhovah représente «un calcul médical et éthique très complexe», prévient David Roy.

Le Dr Roy souligne que des nouveau-nés qui pèsent à peine 800 grammes font face à de nombreux obstacles. Le recours à une transfusion sanguine est une décision importante, qui s'accompagne d'une «grande marge d'incertitude». Afin d'éviter l'acharnement thérapeutique, il faut évaluer les possibilités de séquelles pour le bébé et ses probabilités de survie. «si les probabilités sont très basses, on pourrait, éthiquement, ne pas conseiller la transfusion. Car les parents risqueraient de vivre une double perte : la perte de leur enfant et le sentiment d'avoir enfreint les règles de leur religion, expose le bioéthicien. Mais si les probabilités de survie sont raisonnables ou très hautes, la protection de la vie de l'enfant vient en priorité.» Mais avant tout, «les parents doivent être entourés d'une équipe de médecins qui les informent bien». Si des membres des Témoins de Jéhovah refusaient que leur poupon ait une transfusion sanguine, «il est possible que des médecins ou l'hôpital tentent d'obtenir une autorisation légale», confirme le directeur du Centre de bioéthique de l'IRCM. «Mais pour les adultes ou les adolescents en âge de prendre des décisions, leur volonté est normalement respectée.» «Il y a possibilité d'utiliser du sang artificiel», ajoute David Roy.

D'autres moyens existent pour «contourner» les transfusions sanguines. Aux États-Unis, de plus en plus d'hôpitaux américains offrent des programmes de «médecine sans sang» pour respecter les croyances religieuses de certains patients. Mais il arrive que la religion entre en conflit avec la médecine. En septembre dernier, une adolescente de 15 ans a demandé à la Cour d'appel du Manitoba de lui permettre de refuser une transfusion sanguine jugée nécessaire par les médecins.

Posted by Perry at 03:37 PM

January 10, 2007

Take it one day at a time, mom of six tells parents of Vancouver sextuplets

Provided by: Canadian Press
http://bodyandhealth.canada.com/channel_
health_news_details.asp?news_id=11496&news_
channel_id=145&channel_id=145&rot=11

Written by: CAMILLE BAINS

Jan. 9, 2007

VANCOUVER (CP) - Tina Otten's six kids are busy chatting in the background as their mom recalls the "crazy" roller-coaster emotions she experienced after their high-risk births almost three years ago.

"I always said I wanted six but I never said at one time!" Otten said Tuesday from her home in Granite City, Ill.

The three boys and three girls - Tyler, Joshua, Jacob, Isabella, Madison and Rileigh - will turn three on April 9 and also have a six-and a five-year-old sister, said Otten.

She said she's been thinking about the couple who had sextuplets in Vancouver this past weekend.

Otten said she would tell the parents, who want to remain anonymous, to take the stressful situation one day at a time as doctors look after their premature babies, born weighing about 1.8 pounds each.

"It was just nuts. It was just crazy. You never knew from day to day what they (doctors) were going to say or what you were going to walk in and see because every day they were hooked up to something different," she said of the feeding and intravenous tubes and heart monitors her babies depended on.

"You can have so many things just come together and they can get healthy so quick and then they take two steps back."

Otten's babies were born when she was 30 weeks pregnant, 10 weeks shy of what's considered full-term for a mother carrying one child.

Each infant weighed between 1.13 and 2.15 pounds.

Otten said she took fertility drugs for each of her three pregnancies because she couldn't conceive naturally.

Doctors advised her to consider so-called selective reduction - aborting some of her babies - to possibly maximize the chances of the others surviving.

"I told them don't ever say that again," Otten said.

"I said I just don't want to hear it. I mean, if this is what God put in my hands this is what I have to do. And if He believes I shouldn't have all these kids then He can take them and they can die in His hands and whatever else. I'm not going to decide."

Doctors say having sextuplets naturally is extremely rare, something that happens once in several billion births and that it's likely the Vancouver sextuplets were conceived through the use of fertility drugs.

The Vancouver parents are Jehovah's Witnesses and could have chosen fertility treatment because the religion allows the use of such reproductive measures, said a spokesman for the religion.

Mark Ruge, of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Canada, said couples who can't conceive naturally are free to turn to modern techniques in their quest to become parents.

"The Bible doesn't comment on that subject at all and in Bible times there was no such technology," Ruge said from Georgetown, Ont.

"On matters other than what's stipulated in the Bible, it's up to a person's conscience or their free choice.

"There are a multitude of procedures and treatments out there to help us and so we want the best for us and our children," Ruge said.

That also means the religion has no issues with the feeding tubes and other technology that will be required to keep the babies alive until they are able to eat and breath on their own.

Ruge said the use of fertility drugs is not considered in the same category as the faith's prohibition on blood transfusions.

Jehovah's Witnesses cite a passage in the book of Acts that says to "keep abstaining from . . . blood" as a commandment from God to refuse blood transfusions, even for their children.

Prof. Arthur Schafer, director of the University of Manitoba's Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics, said while Jehovah's Witnesses say fertility treatment is OK based on the Bible not mentioning it, blood transfusions are also not dealt with in the Bible.

"Is there any consistency? I don't think so," Schafer said.

"Their interpretation may be puzzling or difficult to defend but given how they interpret the Bible they are following God's wishes in both cases," he said.

Jen Luloff, the mother of quadruplets in Plattsville, Ont., said she too was advised by doctors to abort two of her fetuses but chose not to.

"We believed if it was meant to be they would come," Luloff said as her kids, who will turn three on May 21, were singing while finishing their lunch.

Luloff said she took fertility drugs because she couldn't get pregnant otherwise.

But multiple births run in her family. Her mother is a twin and lost sextuplets conceived naturally.

Luloff's kids - Morgan, Owen, Hayden and Simon - are all healthy and happy.

She said the parents of the Vancouver sextuplets are likely overwhelmed.

"It's probably just hit them once they actually were born. With these guys, it didn't really feel real until I saw them . . . all these doctors pulling out all these babies."

Gail Moore, a spokeswoman for Multiple Births Canada, said parents who have a whole big bundle of joy arrive all at once need a lot of support from the community.

She said that in the past, national organizations stepped up to help families but now that's no longer the case because of the increasing number of multiple births.

Moore, who has twins, said she recently got the cold shoulder from a large car manufacturer when she asked about a discount program for families coping with several kids born at once.

"I was basically told that this is not a disease and this is a choice your community has made and we're not about to hand out money to that kind of a cause," she said from New Liskeard, Ont.

Moore said the greater number of multiple births in the last few years isn't just from women undergoing fertility treatment.

Women are having babies later and older women tend to conceive multiples.

Healthier and heavier women who are pregnant with multiples are also getting better health care than in the past, Moore said.

Women who have pined for a child for years need as much support as possible from the community because they've already endured so much emotional and financial stress just to have kids, she said.

Posted by Perry at 03:01 PM

Questions arise over sextuplets' care

Toronto Star
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/169562

Possible need for blood transfusions clashes with Jehovah's Witness belief

January 10, 2007

Isabel Teotonio, Staff reporter

VANCOUVER–As Canada's first sextuplets continued to fight for survival in a Vancouver hospital yesterday, questions surfaced about what medical interventions would be taken if the babies need blood transfusions, which would conflict with the faith of their parents, who are Jehovah's Witnesses.

Dr. Brian Lupton, a neonatologist who is part of the medical team caring for the siblings, would not divulge specific details about this case, but did say yesterday that many premature babies born at 25 weeks gestation do require blood transfusions.

There are several reasons for this. According to the Hospital for Sick Children's kids' health website, premature babies become anemic sooner than full-term infants because they start out with fewer red blood cells. They also lose blood from frequent blood tests.

Many premature babies become anemic before their bodies can make red blood cells, so they may need a transfusion. The smaller a premature baby is, the more likely he will need one or more blood transfusions in the first two months of life.

Citing the family's desire for privacy, Peter Cech, a spokesperson for B.C. Women's Hospital and Health Centre, would not reveal if any of the babies need transfusions, or if the parents have signed directives forbidding them.

However, Cech said, "the hospital involves the family in all decisions regarding patient care."

Dr. Timothy Rowe, head of reproductive endocrinology and infertility at the University of British Columbia, said it's "not common these days for any medical intervention to seek legal muscle to enforce it."

"Dealing with babies of this size, I think the parents' wishes would always be accepted," Rowe said.

No updated information on the babies' status was released yesterday, but during a media conference Monday night, doctors listed their condition as fair, meaning their vital signs were stable and within normal limits.

The greatest hurdles facing the four boys and two girls, each about the size of an outstretched hand and weighing around 1.8 pounds, are difficulties breathing and a greater susceptibility to infection. Long term, the babies are at risk of suffering neurological and developmental deficiencies as well as hearing and vision problems.

Yesterday, the parents, who are reportedly from the Vancouver area but whose identities have not been made public, refused to speak with reporters and asked for privacy.

According to Jehovah's Witnesses, all blood transfusions are forbidden. All Jehovah's Witnesses are expected to carry with them an Advance Medical Directive card ordering that no blood transfusions be given under any circumstances.

When entering hospitals, Jehovah's Witnesses sign forms releasing physicians and hospitals of any possible damage caused by their refusal to have transfusions.

But refusing blood does not make Jehovah's Witnesses anti-medicine, said Mark Ruge, director of public information at the Canadian headquarters for Jehovah's Witnesses.

There are many effective non-blood medical alternatives, such as non-blood volume expanders, he said, adding their beliefs are rooted in Biblical Scripture.

"Non-blood treatment is way superior in every situation and many doctors in hospitals worldwide are calling it the gold standard," Ruge said from his office in Georgetown, Ont.

"Even for young children and babies, there are alternatives – no (blood) transfusion doesn't mean you're going to die. ... To have blood is not the superior way, even though the little jingles on TV say blood gives life.

"Parents want the best for their children and so do we; we consider life very precious," said Ruge. "We love our children dearly; we're very family oriented... but there can be a public misperception."

Few details about the actual births of the sextuplets have been made public. Hospital officials will only say that one child was born Saturday around 8:30 p.m. and the other five were born Sunday morning.

Citing the family's desire for privacy, the hospital will not even confirm the sex of the babies, their birth weights, or how many physicians and nurses were involved in the delivery. Nor will officials say if the mother underwent fertility treatments, which often result in multiple births.

What surprised many was the hospital's decision to reveal the family's religion, a move that was made specifically at the request of the parents, said Cech, adding that information had already been leaked to media.

"I'm very curious about that," remarked Elder Fred Sherman of the Jehovah's Witnesses Assembly Hall in Surrey, B.C. "So what if they're Jehovah's Witnesses? What difference does it make? If they were Catholic would the hospital have said that?"

His comments were echoed by Ruge, whose office yesterday was flooded with calls.

"If a Catholic had sextuplets would people call the Vatican?" he asked, adding he found it "highly unusual" that the family requested their religion be made public.

"When there's a car

Posted by Perry at 02:56 PM

Dilemma for Jehovah's witness sextuplets

Vancouver Sun
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
news/story.html?id=12591a0a-d239-
4b72-82f4-9bf455e1a8c9

Premature babies often need blood transfusions, MD says
by Pamela Fayerman, Vancouver Sun

January 10, 2007

Most very low birthweight infants born at 25 weeks gestation require multiple blood transfusions, neonatologists say, which could be a dilemma in the case of Vancouver's four-day-old sextuplets, whose parents are Jehovah's Witnesses.

Although it is not known how devout the parents are, Jehovah's Witnesses are generally adamant about refusing blood transfusions on the grounds that the Bible states people should "abstain" from blood.

Dr. Brian Lupton, a neonatologist at B.C. Women's and Children's Hospitals, where the six infants weighing just 700 to 800 grams were born last weekend, confirmed Tuesday that blood transfusions are often required in infants so premature.

Dr. Susan Albersheim, another neonatologist at the hospital who also has a PhD in ethical issues in neonatal decision-

making, said that in 2004, 10 of 14 babies who entered the intensive care unit at 25 weeks gestation required transfusions, each receiving an average of six transfusions.

In 2005, 22 of 23 premature (25 week gestation) infants in the hospital's neonatal intensive care unit received an average of five transfusions during their hospital stay.

Blood transfusions are often required because premature babies have low volumes of circulating blood and are anemic (with too few red blood cells and insufficient iron) during the first months of life. As well, their blood counts drop due to blood loss from frequent blood-drawing tests that must be done to monitor their health.

Neither Lupton nor Albersheim would disclose whether the transfusion issue has already arisen for the sextuplets or what the hospital would do if the babies' parents refused to follow their medical recommendations.

"In our unit, a significant proportion of babies require transfusions. It's such a stressful experience for parents who have a baby in intensive care. But we certainly do our best to work with parents and not get to the point of conflict with parents," said Albersheim.

"Health care teams must do their best to inform parents as well as possible and to take time to really listen well. It is a very complex situation . . . We have to weigh treatment benefits, risks and outcomes, the short and long term, and it is not a simple matter," she said.

The parents of the babies, believed to be the first sextuplets in Canadian history, have not given the hospital permission to reveal any information about their treatment or current status.

They have asked for total privacy and have not even allowed a church leader to visit them, according to church elder Roland Alford. However, their faith was one of the few pieces of information they asked the hospital to divulge.

Summing up the position of Canadian case law recently, Arthur Schafer, one of the nation's leading ethicists, said judges generally decide that competent adults have a fundamental right to refuse medical treatment, but the situation is different when it comes to children and "if there is a safe and effective treatment that would save a child's life and if the family refuses to give its consent, then Canadian courts usually feel obliged to intervene.

"In this manner, many Witness children have been forced to have blood transfusions even though they and their families object strenuously," Schafer, director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics at the University of Manitoba, said in a CanWest newspaper opinion piece.

Mark Ruge, the Ontario-based director of public information for the Jehovah's Witnesses Watchtower Bible Society, said Tuesday that while the Bible obviously says nothing about high-tech fertility treatments -- a form of which was likely used to produce the sextuplets -- it is clear on blood transfusions.

He said numerous medical institutions are using synthetic alternatives to blood and blood byproducts for Jehovah's Witnesses followers, who number about 110,000 across Canada, and expressed hope that such alternatives would be used for the sextuplets if treatment is required.

"Jehovah's Witnesses want the best medical care -- but without blood transfusions," he said.

Albersheim said the synthetic product to which Ruge referred -- recombinant human erythropoietin -- is not used routinely because of some concerns about potential complications but "we do use it in extenuating circumstances. In some circumstances, it helps the body to produce red cells earlier."

A study done at B.C. Children's Hospital in 1995 found the product had only a modest impact on anemia in premature babies and that some babies would still require conventional blood transfusions.

"Strategies to minimize blood loss, such as the development of microtechniques for laboratory monitoring, the avoidance of unnecessary laboratory tests, and, perhaps clinical acceptance of lower hemoglobin levels, are likely to be most most effective in reducing transfusion requirements at this time," the B.C. authors said in the study published in The Journal of Pediatrics.

Albersheim said all of those suggestions are followed, but transfusions are still a required intervention in many premature infants.

pfayerman@png.canwest.com

Posted by Perry at 02:52 PM

La naissance de sextuplés pourrait relancer le débat sur la transfusion

Presse Canadienne
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/article/
20070110/CPACTUALITES/70110024/
1064/CPACTUEL

Le mercredi 10 janvier 2007

Vancouver

La naissance de sextuplés, le week-end dernier à Vancouver, pourrait bien relancer un débat éthique.

Les parents des poupons, qui sont nés après une grossesse de 25 semaines, font partie des Témoins de Jéhovah. Or, les membres de ce mouvement religieux n'acceptent pas de recevoir des transfusions sanguines.

Des spécialistes affirment que des bébés nés aussi prématurément ont souvent besoin de transfusions pour éviter de développer une anémie qui pourrait menacer leur vie.

Si ce traitement devenait nécessaire, les autorités pourraient devoir s'adresser aux tribunaux pour imposer un tel traitement. En 1995, la Cour suprême du Canada a établi que les intérêts des enfants l'emportaient sur les droits religieux des parents.

Posted by Perry at 02:46 PM

January 02, 2007

When faith and medicine collide

http://ca.today.reuters.com/news/
newsArticle.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&story
ID=2006-12-25T005825Z_01_N14306773_RTRIDST_0
_LIFESTYLE-USA-RELIGION-MEDICINE-COL.XML

Sun Dec 24, 2006

By Michael Conlon

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Any nurse can walk into a bad situation. The one Luanne Linnard-Palmer can't forget came as she readied a little boy for a blood transfusion only to be told by his mother "You know you're damning his soul to hell!"

The child's mother was a Jehovah's Witness, a faith that rejects blood transfusions. Her son had sickle cell anemia and had become extremely weak.

"It blew me away," Linnard-Palmer recalls years later. "I worried not only about my own reaction but what was going to happen to this child with a lifelong disease."

The incident planted the seeds for a newly published book by the California nurse, "When Parents Say No: Religious and Cultural Influences on Pediatric Healthcare Treatment," published by Sigma Theta Tau International.

In the case that was seminal to the book, doctors went to court and got a four-hour guardianship of the child so they could carry out the transfusion against his mother's will.

The boy went home after the transfusion and the nurse who had been so affected by the case has no idea what happened to him after that.

"American families move, change jobs. There are no longitudinal studies looking at this, at what happens the next time they receive medical care," she said in an interview.

The challenges she recounts are both religious and cultural.

A 14-year-old Muslim girl with severe burns on her arm from a cooking oil spill was recovering after surgery until her parents heard the surgeon talk about a graft made with pig skin. They demanded it be removed and the girl was ultimately left with almost no function in her lower arm.

A preteen girl with a large and rapidly growing neck tumor was recommended for immediate chemotherapy but her family said they needed three to five days to pray with their Christian congregation beforehand. After officials threatened to take guardianship of the child, she was brought back for treatment after just one day.

"But the family had been willing to risk, not maybe death, but the need for immediate treatment in order to fulfill their duties spiritually," Linnard-Palmer said.

"Just recently we had an Hispanic mother who said through interpreters that in her background men were the decision makers. Her young son is a very brittle diabetic cared for by an uncle who loads him up with sugar after school," she said.

"So now he's very ill. But she said she couldn't go against the men in her house. If they're going to give him sodas and cookies they're going to do this," she added.

LAYING-ON OF HANDS

Linnard-Palmer, a pediatric nurse at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco and a professor of nursing at Dominican University of California in San Rafael, believes that more time, training and money are being spent these days on helping medical personnel deal with religious and cultural issues when it comes to caring for children.

Large urban hospitals, which tend to have more resources, have been out in front. Her hospital has an hour-long conference every two weeks to discuss such problems, she said, and when an incident occurs there is intervention by psychologists and chaplains as well as medical personnel.

While the Jehovah's Witnesses are often mentioned, Linnard-Palmer says she has found increasing complications involving fundamental Christians.

"Over and over I see people who say they won't consent until they speak to a minister or have a laying-on of hands," she added, causing delays in treatment but not necessarily refusals.

Gaining temporary guardianship through the courts is a well-established precedent, she said, though it does not happen all that often. It can have different results -- with some parents relieved that the matter has been taken out of their hands despite their wishes but others who are left in rage.

The extent of the problem in the United States has not been well documented. One often-quoted study published in the journal "Pediatrics" in 1998 found 141 deaths of children in the United States over a 20-year period who were denied medical treatment for religious reasons but whose survival rate with treatment would have exceeded 90 percent.

That study estimated that there were many more deaths which could not be documented.

Rita Swan, one of the authors of that study, told Reuters she believes the problem today is not as bad as it was in the United States 20 years ago. But she said the problem is still very difficult to measure since some religious groups are not forthcoming and deaths due to treatment delays are not always recorded with that as the cause.

"While we don't hear of as many deaths in faith-healing sects as we used to, opposition to vaccines, for example, is increasing and outbreaks of vaccine-preventable disease are increasing, some tied to religious exemptions and some not," she added.

Her group -- Children's Healthcare Is a Legal Duty (http://www.childrenshealthcare.org) -- tracks a wide range of cultural and religious problems affecting children.

Posted by Perry at 03:14 PM

July 27, 2005

Mother linked to cult

Times Record News, USA
July 27, 2005

Woman accused of performing surgery on girl

A woman with alleged ties to the House of Yahweh, a religious cult in Abilene, faces extradition as early as today from the Jack County Jail to Callahan County to face felony injury to a child charges, according to Callahan County Attorney Shane Deel.

Deel said Deziree Kay Gideon, 35, was arrested last week in Young County on an outstanding Callahan County warrant.

Deel said Gideon allegedly performed surgery on her 7-year-old daughter, now deceased, to remove an infection from her leg. He said she used a scalpel to make an incision and stabbed her with a needle in 2003, using packing peanuts to stop the flow of blood. Then Gideon failed to get medical help for her daughter and withheld information from doctors. She was indicted in May 2003. If convicted, Deel said Gideon could face anywhere from five years to 99 years or life if found guilty.

Deel said he had heard a number of reports of people associated with the House of Yahweh failing to seek medical treatment, but they involved adults for the most part.

Continue reading "Mother linked to cult"

Posted by Perry at 02:09 PM

July 26, 2005

Mom accused of performing surgery on child

Associated Press, July 26, 2005

ABILENE — A woman who may have been involved with a religious sect is accused of performing surgery on her 7-year-old daughter, who later died.

Deziree Kay Gideon was arrested last week on an outstanding Callahan County warrant after she was found in Young County, about 90 miles northeast of Abilene, said Shane Deel, the Callahan County attorney. Gideon, 35, remains jailed in lieu of $75,000 bail.

Gideon was indicted in May on a charge of injury to a child, but the indictment was not made public until she was found and arrested. She faces a maximum punishment of life in prison if convicted.

Continue reading "Mom accused of performing surgery on child"

Posted by Perry at 08:12 PM

July 24, 2005

Parents say they did nothing wrong

The Indianapolis Star, July 22, 2005
Paul Bird

2 convicted for failing to seek help before infant girl died said they'll obey court.

FRANKLIN, Ind. -- A Johnson County couple convicted of reckless homicide for failing to seek medical help for an ailing newborn told a judge they would do the same thing under similar circumstances.

Dewayne Schmidt, 35, and Maleta Schmidt, 30, told Johnson Superior Court 2 Judge Cynthia Emkes at a Thursday sentencing hearing they would rely on God to heal their children.

Continue reading "Parents say they did nothing wrong"

Posted by Perry at 11:46 PM

Colo. Couple Sentenced to Probation for Medical Negligence

Associated Press, Nov. 9, 2001

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. -- A couple whose 13-year-old daughter died from diabetes and gangrene after they refused to allow medical treatment, citing their religious beliefs, were sentenced to 20 years probation.

A judge Thursday spared Colleen and Randy Bates prison time but ordered them to provide medical insurance for their remaining 12 children and have the children see doctors whenever necessary.

Continue reading "Colo. Couple Sentenced to Probation for Medical Negligence"

Posted by Perry at 11:39 PM

Blood transfusion ordered for Jehovah's Witness boy

Associated Press, July 23, 2005

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — A judge has overruled a mother's religious objections and ordered a blood transfusion for a 12-year-old boy who is battling sickle cell anemia.

The boy's mother, Leslie Raymond, is a Jehovah's Witness — a religion that believes the Bible forbids transfusions.

The judge said Friday the mother's beliefs posed a threat to Appollo Raymond, who doctors said could die from complications of the disease without the transfusion.

"This is a very difficult balancing act for the court," Judge James Seals said. "I try to give every deference to the religious preference of the parent, but the life interest of the child supersedes the liberty interest of the parent."

Continue reading "Blood transfusion ordered for Jehovah's Witness boy"

Posted by Perry at 11:29 PM

April 21, 2005

Ghana tumour girl ignites debate

A church has found itself at the centre of a debate between religion and the state in Ghana after a 14-year-old girl with a tumour was taken away from her parents to ensure she receives medical treatment.

Continue reading "Ghana tumour girl ignites debate"

Posted by Julia at 06:03 PM

April 18, 2005

Loyalists not always healed by faith alone

Some ailing End Timers had suffered at home

LAKE CITY - Followers of Charles Meade had much to be thankful for during their first seven years in their promised land.

Continue reading "Loyalists not always healed by faith alone"

Posted by Julia at 07:14 AM

April 14, 2005

Jehovah's Witness, 14, loses fight to refuse transfusions

Damian Inwood, with a file from Jack Keating
The Province Tuesday, April 12, 2005

Cancer sufferer cannot turn down blood, judge rules

A 14-year-old Okanagan member of the Jehovah's Witness church has lost a bitter court battle against receiving blood transfusions.

Continue reading "Jehovah's Witness, 14, loses fight to refuse transfusions"

Posted by Perry at 08:54 PM

April 12, 2005

B.C. Supreme Court orders blood transfusion for teen

VANCOUVER - The B.C. Supreme Court on Monday upheld an earlier court order authorizing a blood transfusion for a 14-year-old cancer patient who doesn't want the procedure because she's a Jehovah's Witness.

Continue reading "B.C. Supreme Court orders blood transfusion for teen"

Posted by Julia at 06:23 PM

Mental health bill gets star treatment

TALLAHASSEE - A Church of Scientology group brought celebrity firepower to the Capitol Tuesday, recruiting actor Kelly Preston to lobby for a bill that aims to restrict mental health services in public schools.

Continue reading "Mental health bill gets star treatment"

Posted by Julia at 06:04 PM