The Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses has announced a significant change in its position on blood, allowing members to decide, according to their personal conscience, whether to accept or donate the four major components of blood.
The organisation disclosed the change in a statement issued by its World Headquarters in Warwick, New York, and published on its website on Friday.
Under the new position, individual Witnesses may decide whether to accept red blood cells, white blood cells, plasma or platelets from another person.
“The decision to accept red cells, white cells, plasma or platelets from another person’s blood is a matter of personal conscience,” the organisation said.
It also said members would have to make their own decisions about donating blood when it is specifically intended to provide blood components or fractions for another person.
However, Jehovah’s Witnesses said the change does not extend to whole-blood transfusions, which remain prohibited under the organisation’s longstanding religious teaching.
“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 statement said.
Paul Gillies, an international spokesman for Jehovah’s Witnesses at the organisation’s World Headquarters, said blood continued to hold religious significance for members.
“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 individual conscience between each Witness and Jehovah.
The organisation said the latest adjustment followed previous changes concerning the use of blood fractions and a person’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.
On medical treatment, the organisation said its members seek conventional medical care and do not practise faith healing.
“Jehovah’s Witnesses love life and want the best available medical care. They do not practise faith healing, and they seek out doctors who can provide effective treatment in accord with their wishes, values and beliefs,” the statement said.
Gillies further said local congregations would not intervene in decisions that members were entitled to make according to their conscience.
“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.
He also expressed appreciation to physicians who provide medical care while respecting Jehovah’s Witnesses’ religious preferences regarding blood.
The organisation said Jehovah’s Witnesses have more than nine million members worldwide, with congregations in more than 200 countries and territories.
The latest announcement follows a clarification issued by the religious group in March concerning the use of a member’s own blood during surgery and other medical procedures.
Under that clarification, individual Witnesses could decide whether their blood could be removed, stored and later returned to them during treatment, while the organisation maintained its refusal to accept blood from another person.
The latest decision therefore represents a further shift in how Jehovah’s Witnesses apply their religious teaching on blood, while leaving their prohibition of whole-blood transfusions unchanged.
