Hospital wins blood transfusion case

http://www.4bc.com.au/news/hospital-wins-in-jehovahs-blood-transfusion-case-20150629-gi092c.html

Alternative Medicine and Jehovah’s Witnesses

When I was a jw child, as I have written about before, essential medical care was withheld from me. 

At that time (and for the record, this was before the discovery of HIV in the blood supply), the jws I was associated with were heavily into folk "remedies".  They did not trust, and avoided, standard medical care. I happened to come across some older publications that rather thoroughly document this "race memory", if you will, that jws have about modern medicine. Back then of course they were no longer producing those bizarre, paranoia-fueled cartoons, conspiracy theories, and calling doctors "The Serum Trust" and things like that. But the paranoia and bizarre beliefs remained as strongly as it had been in earlier decades.

Many of the jws were distributors of a line of vitamins and herbs known as Shaklee. They were really taken in by the sales pitch, believing Shaklee had a remedy for everything, eliminating the need for Western medicine. They had all the answers and doctors were blinded by Satan, who was trying to trick jws into taking blood products.

Blood was the subject of many of their delusions. It became routine to hear a rumor of animal blood being hidden in a certain product, jws boycotted it and engaged in letter writing campaigns to the manufacturers (counting this as evangelizing on their required monthly time cards). I was not allowed to eat Milky Way candy bars, hot dogs, and lunch meats at various times because of alleged "hidden blood". (There were similar issues with witchcraft—there would be a rumor that a company donated to Satanism or witchcraft, so we’d throw out the products and boycott them too.)

Doctrine prohibited them from having any medical treatment involving blood, even a drop. If you research this, yes, you will find some literature quotes contradicting this, along with ones confirming it. That's one of their tactics--if they don't want you to do something but don't really want to commit to it in writing, they use veiled and contradictory statements in print, while verbally prohibiting it from the pulpit. Many times they would say anyone taking blood was weak of conscience and therefore should be socially scorned within the group (socialization outside the group was prohibited too).

That being said, you can begin to imagine what it was like having a life-threatening genetic disease that can only be treated with blood, while being a part of this religion. What a paradox for a parent! The elders helped mine resolve it by teaching us that I'd be resurrected and it was ok to die for faith. (This “sacrifice” was bragged about in Awake! Magazine, whose cover featured dead children.) That paradox was further glossed over by placing a lot of faith in Shaklee’s unproven cures to save me.

One thing jws are infamous for is reading enough medical information to be dangerous, and misapplying it. There have been several instances when they read about a treatment for one disease and think it's effective for other diseases.

One of those remedies, for me, was Shaklee alfalfa tablets.  Alfalfa naturally contains Vitamin K. This company's products were touted as completely safe, free from side effects, because they were "natural". This product, though, does have some serious side effects, which I experienced.  Alfalfa contains Vitamin E, which makes my disease worse.

My condition deteriorated and I was on the brink of death multiple times, which you can read about here or here.

Pathetically, the jws’ delusions about modern medicine flipped the truth on its head. Their use of herbs was fine because it was “in the Bible and Jehovah gave them to us to use”, while modern medicine was considered witchcraft.

Ironically, the jws only believed in certain alternative healing and completely scorned others. I was often told the story of Rasputin, who they said used false religion and demons to cure a blood disorder. They ruminated about this, and with each iteration, the belief took another turn. Eventually, I was personally demonic because Rasputin was.

Scientific illiteracy is dangerous and deadly!

Breaking news--1st ever public criticism of anti-transfusion church by a Jehovah's Witness hemophiliac now published

The unique story by a hemophiliac who spent part of her childhood in a fundamentalist cult that only prohibited one type of medical treatment--the one she needed to stay alive--is now available for download.

This first-ever critique of the church by a hemophiliac member details her experiences nearly dying for the church.  The church's now-failed 1975 apocalyptic prediction diminished her ability to get proper treatment.  Her family and church elders adopted a dismissive attitude, because the resurrection was to happen in the immediate future.

As a young child, pastors did practice drills with her on how to evade medical questions, refuse blood, and escape from a hospital if given a transfusion.  She suffered bleeding episodes that lasted hours, even days at a time, while having grisly adventures trying to survive amidst kooky cultists who claimed she was a demon-possessed vampire.

The church's archaic beliefs about the inferiority of women affected their handling of this girl's medical care, right down to telling her that her life-threatening menstrual periods were deserved because of Eve's original sin.  The church's teachings at the time claimed women were intellectually and spiritually inferior.

An effective treatment for her disorder--birth control pills--was not allowed because elders claimed it would cause her to be morally loose.  Members even interfered with how she held her head during nosebleeds and told her she would be regarded as "damaged goods, like a rape victim" if she had a transfusion.

As an adult, she spoke with a former member of the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses, who informed her the church had secretly reversed its position on hemophilia treatment without announcing it, for fear of embarrassing itself over its wrong decision.  It was this that led her to share her personal story and the private details of her experience that illuminate the brutality of the church's actions in her case.

The article contains extensive references to church literature and secular sources to support her claims.

The church's teachings and actions have not improved much since then.  Their website still clearly states this medical treatment is a serious sin.  In the mid-1990s its magazine cover proudly featured photos of children who died from failure to get this treatment.

For more information regarding concerns over the church's actions and teachings, visit http://ajwrb.org/.