Most people will consider the noblood doctrine as being something that affects only the JWs involved and they rarely consider the medical professionals who have to deal with them and the tremendous emotional and mental toll the medical professionals are forced to deal with when confronting senseless death.
The following is an excerpt from a medical doctor's blog:
I do not worry much about being dead although the process of getting there gives me pause. I have witnessed a few unpleasant deaths and I hope to never see the Grim Reaper coming my way.
One of the more awful and pointless deaths occurred early in my career. I had a patient with hepatitis C and cirrhosis. He had low platelets, low clotting factors (many of which are made by the liver), a previously undiagnosed clotting disorder, and a mouth full of bad teeth that were removed all at once when he acquired dental insurance.
Then he started to ooze blood from his extractions. An ooze that did not stop, it was a constant trickle of blood that would not clot. After several visits to his dentist he almost passed out and came to the emergency room. After 4 days he had bled out about half his blood volume, his haemoglobin had gone from 12 to 6. At this point we geared up for transfusions of red cells and clotting factors and he let us know that he was a Jehovah’s Witness and, no thank you, he would not accept any blood or blood products.
For the next week he continued to ooze despite all the interventions we could come up with to stop the bleeding and he remained adamant in his refusal of transfusions of any kind, despite the risk of death. At about a hemoglobin of 2 he had a large stroke and severe muscle pain from ischemia. At 1 he had a large heart attack and died. If you could rank deaths as pointless and horrific, this would be in my top 10. And I was struck at how nonplussed the family was, accepting this completely preventable death matter-of-factly.
The Jehovah’s Witness, at least by that name, started in 1931 and began the doctrine of no transfusions in 1944 based on two biblical verses, Genesis 9:4:
"But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it."
and Leviticus 17:10-14:
"I will set my face against any Israelite or any foreigner residing among them who eats blood, and I will cut them off from the people.
For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.
Therefore I say to the Israelites, “None of you may eat blood, nor may any foreigner residing among you eat blood.”
‘Any Israelite or any foreigner residing among you who hunts any animal or bird that may be eaten must drain out the blood and cover it with earth,
because the life of every creature is its blood. That is why I have said to the Israelites, “You must not eat the blood of any creature, because the life of every creature is its blood; anyone who eats it must be cut off."Sounds more like an admonition against steak tartar or vampirism to me. Jehovah’s Witnesses will accept some products derived from blood but not others, for example albumin. The fine points and the splitting of hairs of doctrine have always baffled me and perhaps are better explained by others.
Several years later we had a grand rounds on transfusion medicine. The head of the bloodless surgery program discussed ways to avoid transfusions and he kept using the word “respect” in relationship to Jehovah’s Witness avoidance of transfusions. Respect? “Admire (someone or something) deeply, as a result of their abilities, qualities, or achievements.” Nope. Understand? Yep. Accept? You bet. Part of what makes America a great place is we all get to do whatever dumb ass activity that suits us. But it is impossible to respect a belief that demands people to drip away their life’s blood.
*read more here: https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/religion-and-scam/