Jehovah’s Witnesses have announced a major adjustment to their long-standing blood transfusion policy, allowing members to personally decide whether to accept or donate four main components of blood.
The organisation said the decision covers red blood cells, white blood cells, plasma and platelets, with individual members now free to make decisions concerning their use, based on personal conscience.
The announcement was contained in a statement issued by the Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses at its World Headquarters in Warwick, New York, and published on the organisation’s website on Friday.
“The decision to accept red cells, white cells, plasma or platelets from another person’s blood is a matter of personal conscience,” the statement added.
The organisation also said members can decide whether to donate blood for the specific purpose of providing components or fractions for use by another person.
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However, Jehovah’s Witnesses stressed that the adjustment does not represent a change in its position on whole-blood transfusions.
“The long-standing refusal of whole-blood transfusions on religious grounds, a core teaching based on the command to ‘abstain from blood’ (Acts 15:20), is unchanged,” the organisation said.
International spokesman for Jehovah’s Witnesses at the World Headquarters, Paul Gillies, said the group continues to regard blood and life as sacred.
“Blood remains sacred to Jehovah’s Witnesses, who continue to regard life and blood as precious gifts from God,” Gillies said.
He added that medical decisions involving blood components were matters of conscience between individual Witnesses and God.
The organisation said the latest adjustment followed previous clarifications concerning blood fractions and the use of a member’s own blood during medical procedures.
“Since the Bible does not comment on such decisions, they are a matter of individual conscience. That same reasoning has now been extended to the four main components of blood,” it said.
Jehovah’s Witnesses also said they seek medical treatment and do not practise faith healing.
The organisation said its members “love life and want the best available medical care,” adding that they seek doctors capable of providing effective treatment while respecting their wishes, values and beliefs.
Gillies further stated that local congregations would not interfere with members’ individual decisions concerning blood components.
“Congregations do not involve themselves in personal decisions that rest with the individual conscience. We will continue to respect and support the personal decisions of our fellow believers,” he said.
The latest development comes months after the organisation clarified its position on the use of a member’s own blood during surgery and other medical procedures.
Under that clarification, individual Witnesses could decide whether their own blood could be removed, stored and returned to them during treatment, while the organisation maintained its position against receiving blood from another person.
Jehovah’s Witnesses said the religious group has more than nine million members worldwide across more than 200 countries and territories.
