A hospital can give a potentially life-saving blood transfusion to a girl whose Jehovah's Witnesses parents are objecting on religious grounds -- but only if it is absolutely necessary, a High Court judge has directed.

The Dublin hospital made an emergency application on Tuesday seeking an order allowing the transfusion after the parents refused to give consent.

The child, who is four-and-a-half, was admitted to the hospital last Sunday and needed to have fluid drained from her lung. It was possible this draining procedure would lead to severe loss of blood and the child would need to be transfused, the hospital claimed.

But the parents, whose religion prohibits blood transfusions, objected.

Yesterday, the mother of the child appeared in court accompanied by two members of a liaison committee which works with families in situations like this. One of the committee members, Harry Homan, said the mother wanted it to be known that she was very happy with the hospital's treatment of her child, she was objecting on deeply-held religious grounds.

The court heard yesterday from a consultant surgeon who said that while a blood transfusion may not be necessary, it was his clinical opinion that the option must be available before the procedure went ahead.

It was felt by all doctors involved in the case that the procedure could not go ahead without the back up of having a transfusion available, he added.

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Mr Homan, on behalf of the mother, asked the doctor to explore the possibility of using the hospital's "cell-salvage machine" to collect the child's blood and re-use it.

The doctor said if it was possible, they would do this, but in this child's case it would not be possible to save all the red cells.

Ms Justice Mary Laffoy said she was satisfied she did have the power to make an order. She directed the hospital to provide all necessary care for the child including, if necessary, a blood transfusion, but only where no other method is available and she requires medical intervention. "So only if it is absolutely necessary," she said.