Jehovah's Witnesses and Medical Care
Jehovah's Witnesses want to live long and healthy lives. Their religious beliefs promote respect for life and help them prevent many common medical problems.
No faith healing
Because they respect life and value good health, Jehovah's Witnesses accept the vast majority of medical treatments available. (Luke 5:31) Many Witnesses work in the health-care field. Like anyone else, when they are sick, they seek medical care. They do not believe in faith healing. The type of medical treatment selected is a matter of personal choice.
Moral lifestyle protects from common killers
Their Bible-based teachings prevent many health problems both for the Witnesses and for others who read their literature. For example, they believe that Bible principles forbid the use of tobacco and the abuse of drugs. According to the UN Chronicle magazine, "tobacco consumption is the single greatest preventable cause of premature death and disability in the world." Jehovah's Witnesses may use alcoholic beverages in moderation, but they avoid drunkenness.
They closely adhere to the Bible's teaching that sexual relations should be limited to one's marriage mate, and by so doing, they do not contribute to the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. Jehovah's Witnesses do not practice abortion. They shun activities that risk human life, such as driving a car while under the influence of alcohol. They teach high standards of cleanliness, which prevents the spread of infections, diarrhea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and other diseases.
Medical alternatives to blood transfusions can save lives
Jehovah's Witnesses request nonblood alternatives, which are widely used and accepted by the medical community. They do this because of the Bible's command to "keep abstaining from . . . blood." (Acts 15:29; see also Genesis 9:3, 4; Leviticus 7:26, 27; 17:1, 2, 10-12; Deuteronomy 12:23-25.) While Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood for religious rather than medical reasons, many have acknowledged that this refusal has helped the Witnesses to avoid contracting many costly and fatal diseases such as AIDS and hepatitis. Additional information about blood
The medicines and surgical techniques used in place of blood are so effective that doctors now offer them to patients who are not Jehovah's Witnesses. Professor of Law Charles H. Baron wrote that "not only Jehovah's Witnesses, but patients in general, are today less likely to be given unnecessary blood transfusions because of the work of the Witnesses' Hospital Liaison Committees. Patients in general enjoy greater autonomy over a whole range of health care decisions because of the work done by the Witnesses as part of an overall patients' rights movement. And the causes of freedom in general and religious freedom in particular have been advanced by the Witnesses' dedicated resistance to efforts to force them to take action inconsistent with their religious beliefs."
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