About this episode

The episode discusses the longstanding ban on blood transfusions among Jehovah's Witnesses and the implications of a policy change allowing certain blood fractions.

Since the mid 1900s Jehovah's Witnesses have had a ban on blood transfusions. They would take biblical commands to "abstain from blood" literally even though the commands were about how to handle blood from something that was dead, not about using blood to save something that was alive. And when they needed a potentially live saving blood transfusion they would deny it. We all carried around "No Blood" cards in our wallets and purses, little legal documents to speak for us if we were unable to do so. No Blood meant NO BLOOD. People died for their stance. Elders (leading men) in congregations were appointed to Hospital Liaison Committees to come in as enforcers when you were in the hospital to make sure that you did what you were told under the penalty of social death (shunning) if you didn't do as you were commanded. In the year 2000 Jehovah's Witnesses were given permission by their leaders, a small group of men in New York known as the Governing Body, to take minor blood fractions derived from four major blood components. So they were told that if other people gave blood, something that Jehovah's Witnesses would never do to help anyone else, they could take those fractions…

People in this episode

Host: I

Topics covered

• religion
• health
• belief systems
• medical ethics
• personal experience

Keywords

• Jehovah's Witnesses
• blood transfusions
• medical ethics
• Governing Body
• religious beliefs

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Jehovah's Witnesses, Governing Body

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