Jehovah’s Witnesses have adjusted their longstanding policy on blood, allowing individual members to decide according to their conscience whether to accept or donate the four primary components of blood, the organisation’s governing body said on Friday.
In a statement released by the World Headquarters in Warwick, New York, the religious group said: “The decision to accept red cells, white cells, plasma or platelets from another person’s blood is a matter of personal conscience.”
It added that each Witness must also decide “whether or not to donate blood for the clearly expressed purpose of providing components or fractions for use by another person.”
The organisation emphasised that its core position on whole-blood transfusions remains unchanged. “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.
International spokesman Paul Gillies said blood continues to hold sacred status for Jehovah’s Witnesses. “Blood remains sacred to Jehovah’s Witnesses, who continue to regard life and blood as precious gifts from God,” he stated. “We recognise that medical decisions involving blood components are a matter of conscience between each Witness and their God, Jehovah.”
The adjustment builds on earlier clarifications regarding blood fractions and the use of 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,” the statement explained.
Gillies stressed that local congregations will not intervene in these personal choices. “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. “We are grateful, too, for the many skilled and compassionate physicians who provide quality medical care that respects our personal wishes regarding blood.”
The organisation noted that Jehovah’s Witnesses number more than nine million worldwide and are present in congregations across more than 200 lands. Members seek effective medical treatment that aligns with their beliefs and do not practise faith healing, the statement added.
