A Jehovah’s Witness girl may be forced to receive a blood transfusion against her will this weekend when she gives birth in Melbourne.

Victoria’s Mercy hospital was granted supreme court authority on Friday to give the girl blood as a “last resort” if she suffers a postpartum haemorrhage when induced into labour on Sunday afternoon.

The 17-year-old first-time mother is considered to be at increased risk of haemorrhaging because she is of “small stature” and the baby is large, meaning she may have a long labour, an assisted birth or an emergency caesarean section.

Jehovah’s Witnesses forbid followers from receiving blood transfusions or blood products.

The risk to the baby from the mother refusing blood is considered low.

The Human Tissue Act has a provision that minors may be given blood transfusions without parental consent, but it was edited in 1994 with the concept of a “mature minor” who could “make up their own mind”, the court was told on Friday.

However, the child psychiatrist Campbell Paul told the hearing he did not believe the girl had the “decision-making capacity” to be considered as having “Gillick competence” – a term used to describe whether a child can consent to their own medical treatment.

Paul said the girl had “been through considerable disruption and trauma through her life” and had “transgressed a major value of her family and her community” by having pre-marital sex.

“You could imagine that she feels very frightened” and worried about “further punishment”, he said.

The obstetrician and gynaecologist Jacqueline van Dam told the court she was concerned about the girl’s “naivety” that if anything happened, “she would be protected by her faith”.



She said several strategies could be undertaken first in the case of haemorrhage, such as injecting a drug to limit bleeding or stitching the uterus.

Profile Who are the Jehovah's Witnesses and how do they operate? Show Jehovah’s Witnesses are members of a Christian religious movement. In 2017, the group reported an average global monthly membership of approximately 8.2 million people, about 137,000 of whom are in the UK. The organisation is governed by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania corporation, which has its headquarters in New York. It is the main legal entity used worldwide to direct, administer and disseminate doctrines. Jehovah’s Witnesses base their beliefs only on the text of the Bible and ignore “mere human speculations or religious creeds”. Members reject what they see as the sinful values of the secular world and maintain a degree of separation from non-believers, whom they call “worldly people”. The congregation is served by overseers, or elders. Only men can serve in these positions and they are responsible for congregational governance, pastoral work and forming judicial committees to investigate serious sins. If a Jehovah’s Witness experiences sexual abuse, they are advised to report it to the elders, who will take further action if there is a second witness to the offence or if the accused admits the abuse. The perpetrator will then be called before a judicial committee. Someone who commits a serious sin can be “disfellowshipped”. This involves being shunned by the congregation, which for most members includes their immediate family.

The girl’s mother, who said she would not consent to the hospital administering blood to her daughter, told the court receiving a transfusion would have a significant impact on the girl’s wellbeing.

“Being forced to have that done against her will would be something like having violence done to her or being raped,” she said in a statement read to the court.

“She wants to do the right thing by Jehovah, by God.”

Justice Cameron Macaulay granted Mercy hospital the authority to give the girl a transfusion if necessary as “a last resort” but only if they first used all other strategies to stop the bleeding and obtained authority from two doctors.

“I’m not satisfied that [the girl] has the maturity to understand the consequences of her choice,” he said.

“I do not consider that allowing her, in effect, to choose to die ... is in her best interests.”