SHOT MAN REFUSES BLOOD TRANSFUSION
October 03, 1996
From a newspaper in Rockhampton, Australia. Perhaps the North
Queensland Times
A Jehovah's Witness missionary who died in Cairns Base Hospital on Wednesday [2nd Oct 96] was told by doctors in Port Moresby he needed a blood transfusion because of a gunshot wound, even though it was against his religious beliefs.
Siman Rapley, 30, a missionary with the International Bible Students Association, was shot in the thigh with a shotgun outside the Jehovah's Witness centre in Port Moresby by a rascal gang on Tuesday night.
Association manager Jim Burgess said he was taken to Port Moresby General Hospital where doctors were aware that his religious beliefs prevented him from accepting a blood transfusion.
"The doctor that was taking care of him said that he didn't want to operate on him because he felt he couldn't operate without a transfusion." Mr Burgess said.
The Association paid to have Mr Rapley airlifted by Medivac to the Cairns hospital, where doctors said he died of heart failure, Mr Burgess said.
A spokesman for the Cairns hospital liason committee for Jehovah's Witnesses, Garrie Bennet, said Mr Rapley had died of heart failure and he did not believe his failure to receive blood transfusions because of his faith had affected the outcome.
Cairns District Health Service manager Dr Wally Smith said it was hospital policy that people's religious convictions be respected.
"If we are satisfied that there is a significant religious conviction to refuse blood or blood products, as is usually the case with Jehovah's Witnesses, or if the patient or parent of a child signs a refusal form, then we do not give transfusions." Dr Smith said.
from Recent news reports on blood and Jehovah's Witnesses