Medical Help Vs. Religious Beliefs

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Refusing treatment for your child is basically killing them yourselves. I'm in agreement with Seafort and Graham, here.

[Nickswitz]

And if the bible told you to take a pickaxe to someone's head?

That would be completely contradictory of 90% of the bible... if it did, I would stop reading it and move on to something else that isn't contradictory.

[Captain Seafort]

That would be completely contradictory of 90% of the bible... if it did, I would stop reading it and move on to something else that isn't contradictory.

Christ said "I bring not peace but a sword". His old man killed a good chunk of the Egyptian population and ordered the annihilation of the population of Jericho.

[The piman]

That would be completely contradictory of 90% of the bible... if it did, I would stop reading it and move on to something else that isn't contradictory.

good catch. hopefully most people recognize WHY they should follow what is written in their religious texts and don't just FOLLOW what is written in the book. that could be most unwise.

[Captain Seafort]

hopefully most people recognize WHY they should follow what is written in their religious texts and don't just FOLLOW what is written in the book. that could be most unwise.

Such as refusing blood transfusions because the chances of infection a millennia or two ago were substantial, unlike today.

[stitch626]

hopefully most people recognize WHY they should follow what is written in their religious texts and don't just FOLLOW what is written in the book. that could be most unwise.

Such as refusing blood transfusions because the chances of infection a millennia or two ago were substantial, unlike today.

That has nothing to do with the refusal of blood transfusions (at least among Jehovah's Witnesses and early Christians). Transfusions didn't exist (or so I think) back when the verse was written. And even if it they did, the understanding of microorganisms and infection did not.

[Mikey]

What Nick was referring to seems to be the increasingly-popular so-called "bloodless" surgery, which is of course not bloodless but requires no transfusion or outside source of blood.

good chunk of the Egyptian population

Small percentage. Just the first-born males, and the army division that chased the Israelites across the Reed Sea.

Here's a question to fuzz the lines: What if we said that the parents, instead of denying treatment, opted for herbalism, ancient Eastern medicine, or shamanism?

[Tsukiyumi]

Nice.

I'd say that they're trying something with proven results, that's only outside of "medicine" because drug companies can't profit from it. Doesn't mean it doesn't work.

[Mikey]

Nice.

I'd say that they're trying something with proven results, that's only outside of "medicine" because drug companies can't profit from it. Doesn't mean it doesn't work.

Sure, but it's not "proven" by the Western scientific medicine - so would the same feelings apply as to parents who outright deny treatment?

I'm playing devil's advocate, of course - I myself use certain homeopathic remedies, and have found accupuncture to be useful as well. But for someone who claims flat-out that parents should not be able to deny treatment to their kids, they should be able to make a legitimate claim as to why non-traditional medicine shouldn't be available either.

[stitch626]

I've always found chicken soup to be the best thing for the cold.

Good point though Mikey, I never even considered that.

[Captain Seafort]

I'm playing devil's advocate, of course - I myself use certain homeopathic remedies, and have found accupuncture to be useful as well. But for someone who claims flat-out that parents should not be able to deny treatment to their kids, they should be able to make a legitimate claim as to why non-traditional medicine shouldn't be available either.

If something's been scientifically proven to be effective, then fair enough. If it's not been proven to be effective, but has been proven not to be harmful, and has anecdotal evidence of it's effectiveness, then I'd have no problem with trying that as well. Relying solely on unproven remedies is not something I would be prepared to tolerate, certainly not if the argument was between a millennia old religious text and the training and experience of an MD.

[Lt. Staplic]

going back to the young children making decisions...I'm tending to agree with Graham and Seafort here. I realized my own mortality pretty early on. My grandfather died when I was 6, and really that's about the earliest that the notion of mortality can really strike a person IMO, if I'd been much younger I don't think I would have gotten it. Even after that I don't know that I would have been properly prepared to make a life or death decision like what we're talking about. There's more to the decision than just knowing what your beliefs are, and what it means to die. There's really another whole level that the decision must be weighed on, which basically involves how devoted to those beliefs a person is. A young person just doesn't have the cognitive ability to take the beliefs they've been taught and apply them to their own experiences in their life to decide if they really believe them or not, instead relying solely on their truth b/c that's what their parents have said.

I also like Grahams wording...feel free to do what you want, until it starts harming other people.

[Tsukiyumi]

...feel free to do what you want, until it starts harming other people.

That's my personal mantra.

[Captain Seafort]

Getting back to Seafort's criterion of proof being needed for non-traditional medicine being an OK treatment option; remember that vaccines with thimerasol were "proven" to have a positive correlation with autism... until the research was found to be fraudulent and the Lancet had to print a retraction and big sloppy apology. Well, the proof was there; should I have stopped getting immunizations for my kids?

No, the proof wasn't there. There was one badly-researched paper with little or no corroboration, but the bloke responsible was a damn sight better at PR than most. Moreover, even if the link were proven, autism is not a fatal condition. Those that MMR guards against can be.

[Mikey]

The fraudulent research was the equivalent of what's generally accepted as "proof" of the efficacy of modern medicine.