Baby Given Blood Despite Parents

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32252, 21 March 1970, Page 19

Baby Given Blood Despite Parents

(N Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) LONDON, Mar. 19. With the life of a 36-hour-old haby boy at stake, the Kent Juvenile Court met in a hospital to hear the belief of Jehovah’s Witnesses on blood transfusion. The third child of a Jehovah's Witness family, of Cobham, Kent, was born on Monday morning. After tests, doctors ordered a complete change of blood, but the parents refused permission. On Tuesday the Rhesus child's condition became worse and officials at Gravesend and North Kent Hospital asked Kent County Coun-

cil Children’s Welfare Department to bring a court order for care and protection against the parents. In a hospital office three Justices of the Peace heard from a doctor that the parents would not consent to any transfusion, and the baby

could die or suffer brain damage. The father said: “The Bible is the truth: I go by it. The Bible says you should not' take blood under any circum-' stances. “1 will not allow a blood transfusion if I can help it. “I am refusing it not for f any other reason but the I truth. He is not going to die.! . We shall see him in the new : world.” The mother said: “We do not want to let him die. I > would like to take the chance 1 J to see whether the blood level' - will fall. If it does not then. - unfortunately, he will have - to die.”

Making an order, Mrs Phyllis Piper, chairman of the Bench, told the parents: “While respecting the religious beliefs we feel that the child has its own right for a chance to live and the possibility of growing into a healthy, normal human being.”

Then the baby, with his parents in tears, was rushed to the blood transfusion centre at Lewisham Hospital.

After a transfusion his condition was said to be “satisfactory in the circumstances." The baby was building up strength.