Just a simple statistical question on the blood issue -

by JWoods 18 Replies latest watchtower bible

  • Gayle
    Gayle

    If 4.5 million American are saved each year out of 306M Americans, that percentage would come to 1.47%, right?

    Then, annually, out of 1M (publisher) American JWs,( not counting even very young and infant non-publisher JW children) 'potentially' (x 1.47%) 14,700 having a need of a blood transfusion, annually. How many of these die?

    Worldwide, out of 7M JWs (again not counting the very young children), at 1.47% ratio, 102,900.

    Is this right,,is this possible??

  • bohm
    bohm

    that number just seem to darn high.. here: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/deaths.htm it would seem the mortality rate is about 0.8% (800 out of 100'000). that would make blood the number one killer right away several orders ahead of cancer...am i missing something?

  • rebel8
    rebel8
    that would make blood the number one killer

    Blood is very far from being the number one killer. Source: Deaths: Final Data for 2006, Tables B, D, 7, 30

    Fatal misidentification errors occur in 1 in 600 000 to 800 000 transfusion. Source: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1123650

    Transfusion-related fatalities are a reportable incident, so stats exist. "FY2008 (October 1, 2007, through September 30, 2008), we received a total of 82 fatality reports. Of these reports, 72 were transfusion recipient fatalities and 10 were post-donation fatalities.

    "Of the 72 transfusion recipient fatality reports, we concluded:

    1. 46 of the fatalities were transfusion-related,
    2. in 8 cases we were unable to rule out transfusion as the cause of the fatality,
    3. 18 of the fatalities were unrelated to the transfusion."

    Source: http://www.fda.gov/BiologicsBloodVaccines/SafetyAvailability/ReportaProblem/TransfusionDonationFatalities/ucm113649.htm

    Here are some stats from other countries who have insufficient access to transfusions: http://www.who.int/bloodsafety/FactFile2009.pdf Just a few excerpts:

    In developing and transitional countries, many people die because safe blood is not
    available, even in some urban health-care facilities. In the southern African region, up to
    20% of maternal deaths and 15% of child deaths are attributable to severe anaemia due to
    malaria. The management of these cases often requires safe and timely blood transfusion.

    More than 536 000 women die every year during pregnancy or childbirth, 99% of them in
    developing countries. Haemorrhage leading to blood loss is the main cause of maternal
    deaths worldwide, accounting for up to 44% of maternal deaths
    in some areas of sub-
    Saharan Africa.

  • AllTimeJeff
    AllTimeJeff

    The blood issue in regard to Jehovah's Witnesses is another example of where they take control of the debate, frame the questions, sell their prepackaged answers, and stick their fingers in their ears to any credible and worthy outside information.

    Lately, most everything that Governing Body 2.0 puts out their is refreshingly free of facts and statistics. They are crystallizing their own argument, which is, "...we think the bible says that you should die rather then take blood, unless its blood fraction medicine."

    I am in a very grouchy mood towards JW's today. Thinking about lives that are lost due to this cult doctrine isn't helping....

  • JWoods
    JWoods
    I am in a very grouchy mood towards JW's today. Thinking about lives that are lost due to this cult doctrine isn't helping....

    +++++ Me too.

    Here is something to think about - if blood transfusions were not a practical necessity in modern medicine - we would be back bleeding people when they got the flu or sticking leeches on them to suck out the phlogistiones. If this atually killed people like the witnesses want to have it - the liability lawyers like John Edwards would be all over the issue and advertising it on TV in the manner of Mesothelioma.

    It is the modern-day equivalent for witnesses to the fear of aluminum pots and pans, the hatred of vaccinations, and the magical diagnosis machines from the times of wing-nut Russell.

  • JWdaughter
    JWdaughter

    I actually have a friend who lost a family member due to a bad transfusion(wrong typing) just a few years ago(brother had failing kidney and was on his last legs when he recieved the transplant/transfusion). Less than 1.5 years ago she came up against needing blood herself when she hemoragged after childbirth. She told me she didn't think twice about accepting blood since her family had researched so much after losing her brother that they knew what happened with him was rare to start with and exacerbated by his extreme poor health at the outset of the surgery. It was a freakish occurance that he was given the bad blood and they knew it. Had he been healthier to start with, he likely could have overcome the bad transfusion. The problem is with him and with MANY transfusion patients is that they are already in the process of dying. That weakens every system. And that is why they are getting medical treatment.

  • JWdaughter
    JWdaughter

    Bohm, the complication rate for those getting transfusions if even 8 out 1000 would be less heinous than the rate of death for those who have uncontrollable hemoragging and don't get blood. (just working with the numbers you gave us.)

    Plenty of medical treatments are weighed by the risk factor of getting them or not. Cancer treatment anyone? Will the medicine kill you before it kills the cancer? Being deathly ill is risky to your life already! Which is why they have come up with treatments to replace organs such as blood, kidneys, hearts, etc.

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    Excellent info rebel, thank you.

  • JWoods
    JWoods

    And of course there are cases of exposure to Hepatitus or HIV from transfusions and an ongoing effort is being made to protect the blood supply.

    This still cannot change the obvious fact that transfusions have a positive benefit. The JW legend of blood transfusions killing people is a straw man designed to reduce the fears created from this simplistic and draconian doctrine.

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