Hi Barbara. As a very reasonable blog, I applaud what you wrote.
I have not invested a great deal of time thinking this through. On the couple of occasions (not counting today) that I have visited the subject in my mind, I have to admit that the claim "thousands of JW's die each year from refusing blood" didn't seem reasonable to me.
Your blog has given me pause to rethink it.
I noted in your anecdotal examples something that JW's try to do when arguing in defense of their blood teaching, that JW's didn't die from blood transfusions, but because they had something else go wrong. In other words, blood or not, there was nothing anyone could have done.
That is so misleading, yet, I know it is a rhetorical tactic used by the GB to explain away their own culpability regarding JW's who die as a result of this ridiculous blood doctrine.
Your point regarding the difficulty in documenting why a person dies in a hospital setting is well taken. While many of the examples you gave were of those up in years, the point is, those who are old can live even longer and even have their medical conditions treated were the JW handcuffs taken off doctors.
In the end though, to make this claim is to try and direct media attention to the problem. It is unreasonable to expect, imo, that the GB would ever change their stance, because it would just open them up to too many lawsuits. However, any information that gets out their that a JW can get their hands on and cause them to think and rethink their personal decisions on blood medicine could very well save lives......
Regardless of exactly how many die each year due to the JW blood doctrine (and I am sure it is substantial), the fact remains that thousands of JW's are harmed each year, and have resulting shorter life spans, as a result of the JW ban on blood transfusions.
