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Questions From Readers

■ Is there any Scriptural reason why Jehovah’s Witnesses should not accept blood substitutes or “artificial blood”?

It is well known that for religious reasons Jehovah’s Witnesses do not accept blood transfusions. Since Noah’s time true worshipers have refused to eat blood. (Genesis 9:3, 4) Blood removed from a creature was to be disposed of; it was not to be stored. (Deuteronomy 12:22-25) Christians are commanded to ‘abstain from blood.’ So Jehovah’s Witnesses do not accept transfusions of donor blood; nor do they permit their own blood to be withdrawn, stored and later transfused back into their veins.​—Acts 15:28, 29.

However, Jehovah’s Witnesses have no religious objection to replacing lost blood with nonblood solutions. Some of these more commonly used are saline solution, Ringer’s lactate, dextran and Hespan.

Doctors recognize that such plasma-volume expanders have advantages, a major one being that these do not expose the patient to the numerous diseases and other risks of blood transfusions. Furthermore, evidence shows that most patients can accommodate a much lower blood count than once was thought possible.

In recent years there has been experimentation with a fluorinated blood substitute (so-called artificial blood) that seems to be able to transport oxygen to body cells. There is a calculated risk in using this until such time as it has been fully tested. But it is not made from blood and so its use would not conflict with a Christian’s Bible-trained conscience.