Here's the full story, published March 26:
http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSLaw0203/26_transfusion-sun.html
Transfusion girl: I want the best treatment
By MELISSA RIDGEN-- Sun Media
CALGARY -- A 16-year-old leukemia patient who has been ordered by the court to undergo blood transfusions, spoke out for the first time yesterday saying she wants the treatments stopped in favour of a different treatment offered in the U.S. which doesn't go against her religious beliefs.
The girl -- who is now a ward of the province and cannot be named -- wants to go to Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles where a doctor has offered her a treatment option that won't compromise her beliefs as a Jehovah's Witness.
"Not only is it better for me mentally with my religious beliefs, but I would be respected and treated with dignity as a person and I would be given better medical treatment," she said from her room at the Alberta Children's Hospital yesterday, where her lawyer said she has been restrained and forced to undergo treatment she doesn't want.
"I just want the best treatment for my leukemia and if that's at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre then that's where I want to be."
It will be up to the court to decide whether she goes to L.A., and it isn't known how treatments there would be paid for.
The girl was diagnosed in mid-February with acute myloid leukemia and after a court fight, she was ordered to undergo the life-saving blood transfusions, which her father supports but her mother does not.
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