Jehovah’s Witness Rejects Pleas for Husband's Life-Saving Blood Transfusion
Pastor Dale Morgan
Jehovah’s Witness Rejects Pleas for Husband's Life-Saving Blood Transfusion*
Friday , June 06, 2008
A mother sobbed over her Jehovah's Witness husband as he fought for life
last night — but still refused to let him have a life-saving blood
transfusion.
Sheila Edwards insisted that her horrifically injured husband, John, 57,
would not want doctors to give him blood because their religious faith
bans it.
But her agonizing decision has left the family in a nightmare situation.
Their sons Jonathan, 36, and Tom, 29, do not share their parents’
beliefs and can only look on helplessly as John lies close to death.
It was unclear last night whether they had begged their mother to change
her mind — or had accepted their father’s fate.
John suffered massive injuries to his left side when a car driven by a
suspected drunk driver hit him near his home in Southall, West London.
Sheila, 61, said council worker John had signed a Witness form banning
doctors from giving him blood in the event of an accident, in line with
the controversial doctrine of their faith. She has not been able to find
the form. But medics have been obliged to act on her instructions
because she is John’s next of kin.
And she is resolutely rejecting pleas to allow a transfusion — despite
warnings that without intervention he could have just two or three days
to live.
A family source said: "Sheila is adamant that John must not have blood.
"She says giving him a transfusion would be like assaulting him — and he
wouldn’t want to live knowing he’d disobeyed his God.