NEW YORK, June 2 (UPI) -- A New York hospital obtained a judge's order allowing doctors to give a transfusion to a woman whose relatives are Jehovah's Witnesses.
Jean Leslie, 55, is now recovering, her mother, Ossein Leslie, told the New York Daily News on Wednesday.
Ossein Leslie and another daughter had refused St. Barnabas Hospital permission for the transfusion. Both are members of the Jehovah's Witnesses, a group that believes transfusions defy a biblical command to "abstain from blood."
"We have faith in God. When The Word is in you, that's what is supposed to help you," Ossein Leslie said. "If you want to be saved, you have to let God save you."
Doctors at the hospital said Jean Leslie would have died without the transfusion and that they had no information on her religious beliefs. Leslie, a stroke victim, was conscious before the transfusion but incoherent.
Ossein Leslie said her daughter had been a Witness since the age of 10. She said she consoled her daughter after the procedure, saying she was not to blame.
She also said she is glad her daughter is getting better.
