Awake!, August 8, 1950
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BLOOD TRANSFUSION THERAPY
Its Prevalence, History and Methods Its Risks, Rackets and Alternatives
Plight of the Palestine Refugees
The tragedy that comes in the wake of war
The Grand Canyon
Nature’s capital city
Blood Transfusion and the Bible
AUGUST 8, 1950 semimonthly
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CONTENTS
Blood Transfusion Therapy—Its Prevalence, History and Methods
Typing Blood
Blood Transfusion Therapy—Risks, Rackets and Alternatives
Death from Transfusions
Diseased Blood
Commercial Traffic in Blood
Plight of the Palestine Refugees
Sunlight Batteries
Tropical Tales of Women
True Identity of the “Apelike Men”
Midnight Marriage in British Guiana! 17 “Drift Toward a Shooting War”
The Grand Canyon—Nature’s Capital City 20
Cawed by a Raging Dragon
Mix-roCost for Greatest Microscope
Waging War Without Bloodshed
Religion in the News
“Thy Word Ib Truth”
Blood Transfusion and the Bible
Chocolate—from Seed to Candy Bar 27
Watching the World
New York Fills Its Drinking Cup
y^lVUAKEZ/
®™Now it is high time to awake.—Romans 13:11 9j
Volume XXXI
Brooklyn. N. Y-, Auguat 8, 1950
Number 15
BLOOD TRANSFUSION THERAPY
Its Prevalence, History and Methods
MANY are the philanthropic movements that make appeals to our neighbor love. This worthy cause and that, we are told, deserve support. Periodic campaigns are put on by the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, the Community Chest. Then there are those primarily concerned with health: the Cancer Fund; the Tuberculosis Christmas Seals, the "March of Dimes” for the sufferers of infantile paralysis, etc.
That all may understand the many aspects to consider In regard to blood transfusion, the “Awake!*’ magazine Is herewith pubUshlng a series of three articles on the subject. These will take up the following points; (1) prevalence, history and methods; (2) risks, rackets and alternatives; (3) the Scriptural position regarding the use of blood In transfusions.
Among such campaigns is one that has come to the fore especially with World War II. Sponsored by the Red Cross, it requests, not our money, hut our blood. And for what purpose ? To be used for blood transfusions, ostensibly to save the lives of others—those undergoing operations, those having had accidents or hemorrhages, those suffering serious blood diseases, and to build up a reserve of plasma to be used in the next war. By contributing our blood in this manner we will save the life of another, we are assured. And much blood is needed. Some hospitals use close to 1,000 pints a month; and in cities like London and New York upward of a quarter million pints are used annually. So, on the radio, in the public press and at public gatherings the theme is sung: "Brother, can you spare a pint?”
The politicians join in the refrain: "Mayor [O’Dwyer—New York] Urges Blood Gifts”; “Sing Sing Lifer Freed by Dewey, Traded Blood with Dying Child”; ‘'Marshall Warns of Emergency Blood
Need”; “Eisenhower Asks: Columbia Faculty and Campus to Give Blood” The entertainment world publicizes its part: the entire casts of two Broadway shows "Give Blood on Stage”. Fraternal societies "adopt” patients with serious blood diseases, supplying them with blood regularly; business firms, labor unions and educational institutions support the Red Cross “Bloodmobiles”.
Most conspicuous are the clergy: "Priest Asks Blood for 2 Ill Children”; "Four Clergymen to Talk on Blood Bank Program”; “Priest’s Plea Brings 150 Donors”; “Churches Aid Blood Bank”; “Red Cross Honors Cardinal”; “Cardinal [Dougherty] Is Cited for Blood Donor Aid,” and pictures show him receiving a certificate of appreciation from the Red Cross officials in recognition of his assistance to their blood donor program. And a Red Cross bulletin states: "most striking feature of the past year's [1949] blood bank program was the cooperation of the Catholic Church/"
While donations of blood in response to such appeals are limited to a pint at a time, many have donated blood repeatedly. Thus the Red Cross tells that of the millions that donated blood during World War II, 1,500,000 donated eight pints and 3,000, 16 pints, or two gallons; this giving an over-all average of two pints per donor.
One Man Gives Four Barrel*/
Nor have some been content to limit their donations to 16 pints. Foremost among such was “Spike” Howard, strong man of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who, over a period of thirty-five years (he died in 1946 at the age of 68), donated 1,100 pints of blood, or more than four barrels! He considered the highlight of his blood donor activity the time he donated five pints within a three-day period,,and during an epidemic he submitted to transfusions every day for six weeks. He had an “after-transfusion diet” consisting of three to four pounds of ground steer meat, spiced with salt, which he felt had something to do with his remarkable ability to manufacture blood.
In the front ranks of living blood donors, though far behind Mr. Howard, is S, Geo. P. Lesur, who received a medal for social merit from the French government upon his donating 135 pints. Among the foremost blood donors in the United States is a Catholic priest, Alexander Btitkowsky, of Poughkeepsie, New York. He is widely publicized for his corpuscle philanthropy, which has already exceeded one hundred pints. And other press reports keep telling of this one and that one giving fifty or more pints of the all-important stream of life.
Different countries have different ways of collecting blood. This was especially true during the last war. After the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, civilian traffic violators were given the choice of paying the fine in dollars or with a pint of their blood. In Germany and in German-occupied countries the people were forced to give blood, in typical Nazi fashion. This caused riots in many parts of Poland. And Russia hit on the happy and practical idea—most repugnant to other lands though—of using cadaver blood, blood of those who died suddenly and who had been apparently in good health. This is collected within eight hours after death. We are told that cadaver blood is used throughout Russia and that her largest casualty and emergency hospital uses nothing else. Russia also makes great use of placental blood (by the organ of communication between a mother and unborn child). At each childbirth from a half to a whole tumblerful of this blood is salvaged, and it is said that her foremost maternity hospital uses only this kind. In the United States there is some use of it, but primarily in making commercial products from blood. The blood that the mother loses in connection with the “afterbirth” is also used in Russia and elsewhere, but it is not nearly so valuable, besides involving the risk of contamination.
So blood has been and is being gathered from the people, at birth, during life and even after death; willingly and unwillingly, by democracies and by the totalitarians alike. Blood transfusion occupies a most respected place in this modern world as concerns almost everybody except . . . Except whom? Except Jehovah’s witnesses, who are in but not'a part of (Ik's wo rid.—John 15: W; 1#: M
History of Stood Transfusion
Of course, being so different in so many other respects it is not surprising that Jehovah’s witnesses should not follow the way of this modern world in regard to blood transfusions.' But why, you ask, do they have nothing to do with it? Can it be that they are not as much concerned with the welfare of their neighbors as others are? Hardly that, for no class of people are so ready to help out as they; in fact, no other class are so fully devoted to unselfish service as they are, Then can it be that they have scru-plea against the practice of blood transfusion? Yes, they do. And why? Because they feel that blood transfusions involve needless risks, or because they are convinced that the transfusing of blood is contrary to the teachings of the Bible? Briefly the answer is: Primarily because they are convinced that the Bible prohibits the use of blood in any form and in any manner by one of another. For a brief consideration of this aspect of the subject please see the article under the heading "Thy Word Is Truth”, on page 25. True, there are risks that should not he overlooked and which will be dealt with at length in this issue of Awake! However, solely on the basis of such risks Jehovah’s witnesses would not make an issue of blood transfusion.
To get a complete and rounded out picture of blood transfusion therapy it seems well to briefly review its history and its methods.
Many people who have no aversion to having a pint of blood transfused into their veins would be quite squeamish about drinking a pint of human blood. But, whether we like it or not, transfusion of blood is the same as eating it, for by means of it the blood of one individual is used to nourish and strengthen another. In fact, there seems to be a measure of inconsistency in this matter, for when glucose solutions are injected into the blood it is referred to as intravenous feeding, and exactly the same method is used today in blood transfusion.
Long before man transfused blood he was taking it by mouth, both animal and human blood. The Bible tells of the drink offerings of blood. (Psalm 16:4) Secular history tells of warriors who drank the blood of those they had slain in battle, hoping thereby to gain the prowess of their victims. Others drank it for medicinal purposes.
In 1492 the physicians of Pope Innocent VIII tried to cure him by means of the blood of three youths whose lives it cost. However, their methods were not successful, and it is stated that the medical gentlemen involved were rewarded for their pains by being executed, with the exception of one who fled the country. Although this is often cited as the first case of attempted blood transfusion, such is doubted by the foremost living authority on the subject (Wiener).
Early in the sixteenth century the idea of blood transfusion was suggested by a physician, and in 1615 one even described in Retail how this might be done, by having the blood flow from one to another by means of tubes. Although there is no record that he tried it himself, yet it is essentially the same method that is still used at times. After many experiments on various animals, with fatal results, a successful transfusion was made between two dogs in 1665.
A few years before, Dr. Denys (Denis), of France, experimented in transfusion in a human, he giving nine ounces of lamb's blood to a lad who was suffering with anemia. As the lad did not die, but got well, Denys was credited with performing the first successful blood transfusion upon a human. However, one writer on this subject observes that what saved the lad was not the transfusion of lamb's blood, but the fact that Dr. Denys did not continue bloodletting the patient, which was so customary in bis day, and because of which the lad suffered from anemia. The amount of lamb's blood, while not doing him any good, was not sufficient to harm him. So the doctor “received applause which should rightly have gone to nature for providing man's body with efficient blood-manufacturing facilities”. Or, as Jehovah’s witnesses would say: “Credit should have gone to the great Creator, Jehovah God, for providing man with such efficient bloodmanufacturing facilities!”
Incidentally, this bit of medical history shows the irony associated with the faith that men put in recognized medical practice: A patient is made worse and laid low with anemia by reason of the doctor's following the customary practice of the day—bloodletting. Another doctor steps in who stops this waste of the body's vital fluid. But, not content to let it go at that, he administers what could have been a lethal potion had the patient been less robust or the amount larger. So, because the patient survived in spite of the doctor’s mistake, the doctor is hailed as the first one to perform a “successful” blood transfusion in a human!
Dr. Denys tried a few more blood transfusions, one of which was in a syphilitic patient and which had fatal results. The wife of the patient sued, claiming that the doctor had poisoned her husband. (And so he had, although not with any poison, but with lamb's blood.) The court, while exonerating him, forbade further blood transfusions. Later the practice was also banned by the French Parliament, the English government and by the pope (1675).
Typing Blood
Early in the nineteenth century interest in blood transfusion therapy revived and men began to use human blood. By 1900 blood transfusions were being used more and more, but generally only in extreme eases, as about half of them resulted in fatalities. The doctors in those days simply could not understand why the stream that gave life to one individual should cause the death of another when transferred to his circulatory system. Experiments had finally established that while fatal results followed when the blood of the various animal species was mixed, there were no untoward reactions when the transfusion was between dog and dog, cow* and cow, etc. But why were transfusions between human creatures not equally successful?
This question was largely answered by Landsteiner (Viennese Nobel prize winner) in 1900 by the discovery of certain factors which cause the agglutination of the red cells. This "gluing together” wag found to be caused by two distinct factors in the serum known as agglutinins and two factors in the red cells which were called agglutinogens. By this discovery all people were divided into four classes. Those whose red cells had agglutinogen “A” belonged to group A; those whose cells had the agglutinogen “B” belonged to group B; those whose cells had both were placed in group AB; and those whose cells bad neither were labeled group 0. The agglutinins of the serum were found to he distributed in a similar manner, enabling a double check to be made as to the compatibility of the bloods involved.
Later two subgroups were found, making six in all. In 1927 the “N” and “P” factors? were found, and later still more subgroups. But even with the greatest care in classifying all these blood groups unfavorable symptoms and even deaths resulted from blood transfusions.
In 1940, after years of experimenting on various animals in efforts to develop a scrum that would detect further blood groups, Landsteiner (pioneer in blood grouping) and Wiener (present foremost authority) discovered another element, the Rh factor, which divided all the race into two more classes. This was so named because it was first located while experimenting with rhesus monkeys. Tests showed that about 85 percent of the white race have this factor, and were therefore called Rh positive, the rest not having it, Rh negative. Tests today are generally limited to the four main AB groups, two of their subgroups and to the Rh factor.
While sex has no bearing on these factors, difference in race does reveal variations in the numbers of the various groups. All these factors are hereditary, following the laws discovered by the
Austrian monk Mendel. Because of this they are gaining more and more recognition in legal circles, often helping to solve a murder or the question of disputed parentage.
In view of the many groups, main and subgroups, the Americana states that at least 400 different classifications are theoretically possible. Not content with this, Wiener, in discussing the over-increasing number of groups that are being discovered, savs that “an individuality of the blood reminiscent of the fingerprints is conceivable”, and adds that Landsteiner was also of this opinion. In other words, it is conceivable that each individual has his own type of blood, and that it could he distinguished from that of anybody else.
Another obstacle which long plagued the blood transfusers was the coagulating characteristic of blood. As is well known, as soon as blood comes in com tact with the air it begins to clot, and clots entering the blood stream might easily prove fatal, especially if they got into the heart chambers. In 1914 this problem was solved by the discovery that sodium nitrate prevented the clotting of blood aud had no bad effects on the heart. Since then all blood is “nitrated” as it is taken from the donor, which also helps in storing it. Dextrose is also added.
Transfusion Methods and Blood Fractions
In transfusing blood a number of different methods have been tried, some of which have proved to be more practical than others. Oldest and most difficult was the “direct” method, in which the two veins were sutured (sewn together). This method is no longer used as it does not permit repeated transfusions. Then came the “semidirect” method whereby the veins were joined together with a quill or tube. In . some instances this method is still used. Most prevalent today, however, is the “indirect” method whereby the blood is first collected in a jar and then fed to the patient drop by drop into a vein. Recently another method has come to the fore whereby the blood is pushed into an artery by air pressure.' This method is used when speed is considered important, as by means of it a pint enters the body in a minute and a half instead of the halfhour that the drop by drop method takes. (It usually takes seven minutes to obtain a pint from a donor.)
Experts claim that stored blood begins to deteriorate after the fourteenth day, although generally it is used until the twenty-first. Because of this perishable nature of blood, dried plasma (blood from which both the wuiter and the cells have been removed) is frequently used, especially in time of war. It also has the advantage of not requiring typing.
Among other elements that are separated and used are serum albumin; the gamma globulins, which contain the antibodies that fight disease; fibrinogen, the blood’s prime clotting agent; etc. These are made into powders, sponges, paste, plastic and tissue, all exploiting their original functions in the blood.
How much blood is used in a single case? This varies a great deal, ranging all the way from a few ounces for an infant to more than 30 pints during the course of a major operation in an adult. Those having serious blood diseases often receive from two to four pints a month, some children having already received from 400 to 500 pints of blood.
So much for our background of the prevalence, history and methods of blood transfusion, in the article following we consider some of the risks involved.
Blood Transfusion Therapy
RISKS, RACKETS, AND ALTERNATIVES
Regardless of the method used, blood transfusion has ever been accompanied by risks. Many are the lives, both of animals and men, that have been sacrificed in experiments of transfusing animal blood in animals, animal blood in man, and human blood in man. That risks are still involved is freely admitted by the foremost authority (Wiener) on the subject:
Since blood transfusion therapy involves a certain though only a slight risk, it must not be employed without definite indication. Unfortunately, this principle is not always followed. Patients are being transfused because of general debility, due to various causes . . . with results not worth the effort or even detrimental. In cases of acute leukemia [disease of white corpuscles'! or carcinomatosis [multiple cancer] the family should be informed of the inevitable outcome rather than be subjected to the expense of a therapy which can at best prolong a miserable existence for a short time.
Danger lurks in such simple matters as the speed with which the blood is given and the amount, especially in heart cases. Hemoglobin contents of blood must be considered. Equipment must be kept aseptic (fully sterilized). Some even recommend giving only a few cubic centimeters of blood at first, and if no untoward symptoms are noticed' then to continue. Of course, if the patient is unconscious such unfavorable symptoms would not Be noted. Blood transfusion should be halted at the first appearance of any unfavorable reaction. .
Blood stored too long may prove worthless or even dangerous. In fact, in $ome cases only fresh blood should be Used, as noted in the New York Times of May 19,1950: “Using Fresh Blood Vital in Maternity. Research Shows Stored Fluid May Lose Clotting Agent, Causing Toxemic Fatality.” Still more serious are the errors in typing blood. Regarding these risks Dr. Wiener further states:
Positive reaction may be missed if the mixture ... is not observed for a long enough time, such as due to the haste incident to an emergency blood transfusion . . . blood of newborn infants may be of low sensitivity, the same is true of stored blood. However, even with fresh blood taken from adults false reactions have been obtained and one of the most common errors is to confuse “AB” blood of subgroup “A2B” for group “B” on account of weakness of activity ... In certain types only careful workers will succeed in making correct analysis.
Also acute infections, bacteria, pregnancy, malignancy (such as cancer) will play havoc with tests, we are told.
Death from Transfusions
Dr. Wiener also relates the case of a donor whom he typed as “AB” who told him that he had on three previous occasions been classified as “O”, which is just, the opposite. (“AB” indicates possession of both agglutinating factors injurious to other blood cells, whereas those having “O” blood are termed “universal donors”, as their blood has neither of these elements.) Upon investigation it was found that in one of these three previous donations the mistake had been discovered and the blood cells separated and only the plasma used without any serious consequences. And in the other two eases 1 In one the patient receiving the blood died four hours after the transfusion, and in the other four days later. Circumstances accompanying their deaths left no doubt in his mind that they were due to hemolysis (destruction of red cells by incompatible serum), but in neither case did the attending physician even suspect that such was the case. The
operation was blamed for one death, the disease for the other. Regarding this failure to properly identify such causes of death Wiener further states:
If fatalities occur after several days from uremia caused by hemolytic reaction, the connection between the death and the transfusion may not be recognized. This explains why, until recently, deaths from uremia following blood transfusions, particularly in pregnancy cases, were erroneously believed to be due to complications of pregnancy, such as toxemia, rather than to transfusion."
A Dr. Frank Lahey, in speaking at an American Medical Association session in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in 1949, also stressed the dangers of mismatched blood “when laboratory tests are not sufficiently complete or carried out with meticulous care”. And in the New York Times of April 2, 1950, a Dr. N. C. Kiefer was quoted as saying that blood was “a commodity that can be lethal unless it is collected and transfused with strict conformity to complex safety standards”.
Among the most serious forms of mistyping is the mixing of the Rh positive with the Rh negative, and especially in the case of women. According to two doctors at the Johns Hopkins Medical School and Hospital, “the danger is that Rh negative women and little girls may be sensitized through hlood transfusion with Rh positive blood. Then if they marry Rh positive men, their babies will be born with severest form of erythroblastosis [a disease of the red blood cells] and usually will not survive.” As an example of this they cite the case of a 'twenty-two-year-old woman whose first baby was jaundiced five hours after its birth because of anti-positive substances in its mother’s hlood. The anti-Rh substances developed as a result of a transfusion of about five ounces of blood when the mother herself was a two-month-old baby suffering with dysentery.
At the Johns Hopkins Hospital cases of this dread malady have increased fivefold in recent years, matching exactly the
AUGUST 8, X9.W
rate of increase in blood transfusions. Since the percentage of Rh negatives in the population is fixed, never more or less than 13-15 percent, the increase must be due to an increase in the number of women sensitized to Rh positive blood because of blood transfusions, the doctors held.
In this connection it is of interest to note that a man was awarded a judgment of $9,000 because of the death of his wife, which occurred, two days after she had received a blood transfusion. A postmortem examination revealed that she was Rh negative whereas she had been given Rh positive blood.
Diseased Blood
Equally as great a risk if not greater than that of mistyping of blood is diseased blood. Regarding blood donors, the authority Wiener states that their “health must be perfect”. An article appearing in the January 29,1950, Sunday Bulletin, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, states:
What many sincere donors don’t know, however, is the fact that blood that is not free from germs may cost the life it was meant to save. For this reason each person who gives blood should be completely honest in telling about the diseases he has had. Each attendant at a blood bank must be meticulous about records and blood tests. ... At one time an investigation showed that almost five percent of the blood collected by one of the leading blood banks was contaminated with the hepatitis virus [a dread liver malady].
After telling of a young girl wTho was given a blood transfusion after an, accident and as a result had a liver ailment that took her longer to recover from than from the accident itself, the article continues:
Various types of viruses, including those of influenza and infantile paralysis, might be present in blood or plasma intended for transfusion, unless the greatest vigilance is exercised. Similarly, such blood or'plasma might carry germs causing malaria and other dis-
eases. Or, it might contain aUergy-proddcing substances, called “allergens”. Such substances might cause hives, asthma, or hay fever , . . The virus of hepatitis, or other viruses, cannot be observed under the microscope. This makes such infection a greater hazard than that from bacterial organisms which arc more easily detected,
The danger that lurks in the transfusion of diseased blood is further emphasized by the news report which told of the widow of a war veteran suing the government for more than $175,000 because he died from a transfusion of blood which she claimed was jaundiced. Emphasizing this risk also, a writer in the Saturday Evening Post for March 25, 1950, tells that this hepatitis virus is one of the hardest to kill and that an individual may have it for five months before he becomes so sick as to bo aware of its presence. Because of the delayed appearance of ill effects, as well as the prejudice in favor of transfusions, the blood transfusion seldom gets blame it deserves.
In view of all the factors that must be considered in the transfusion of blood: the exact amount; the speed with which it is injected; the aseptic (sterile) condition of the equipnumt,' the accurate typing of the many groups; and the danger lurking in contamination of blood —is it not understating the matter to say that there is a "'slight risk involved"?
Commercial Traffic in Blood
And if, even with complete honesty, so many risks are real and present because of the human factors of negligence and forgetfulness, what shall we say as to the risk when circumstances cast a suspicion on the honesty of those involved, because the blood is bought and sold? That people do sell their blood, and that for all kinds of reasons, is everyday news: "Blood Balances City Debt”; “School Boys Sell Blood to Raise Easy Money”; "Church Members Pay for Remodeling Church with Blood”; "Father Sells Blood to Ease Family's Hunger.”
Those ate just a few of the headlines.
And what about the risk involved when blood banks are willing to take blood from literally anybody and ask no questions? Note this report of a columnist for the New, York Mirror of March 6, 1950:
About every three weeks David D. Cohen sells a pint of his blood. . . . We visited three blood banks. They firmly refused to allow me to take any pictures. ... At the first there must have been over 100 people sitting around on wooden benches waiting their turn, mostly men and boys, shabby, beaten, hungry, with unseeing eyes and faces of tallow grey. . . . “They don't give you much of an examination here,” said Dave. “They just check your heart and blood pressure, and don’t ask any questions." . . .
The second blood bank further downtown wasn't crowded at all. The guard at the door said that's because it was so cold. “But on Saturdays we get them a yard deep," fie added. “This place supports a lot of bars. Go over to that one on the corner. The bartender will tell ypu. Every Saturday he picks about eight of them off the Jioor. They just keel over." . . .
[At the third bank | a very nice doctor said that there was no way to keep the eight week rule and no way to check whether a donor was [ving about having malaria or asthma. He said that blood banks get. a. standard $15 a pint from hospitals.
According to a recent patient at one of the more prominent New York hospitals, rates for transfusing a pint of blood wore: $50 for private-room patients, $40 for sen lipri vat e patients and $30 for those in the wards. The Bowery bum gets $5; the blood bank sells it for j$15; the hospital gets $30 to $50.
Nor is this racket limited to NeW York city. Ger clear across the continent, and what do we find? The Los Angeles Mir-ror of January 31, 1949, tells us:
BLOOD FLOWS ON SKID ROW Bi/xjd Mill Drains Poor L. A. Flotsam Exploited
There is a million-dollar red river of blood flowing through Los Angeles. Its source is the human junk pile of Skid Row. It ends in reputable, high-class hospitals all over the city Who reaps the profits to be gleaned from Society’s castoffs who have nothing left to sell but their blood? Is it diseased? Are sick people in hospitals pumped full of rotten blood taken from the dregs of humanity? The buying price in Los Angelos'' Hell’s Half Acre is $4 a pint. The selling price to the hospitals is $25 a pint. Who gets the $21 profit?
Half a dozen “blood banks” in Skid Row daily run hundreds of winos, drunks, degenerates and bums through the blood mill. . . . One man has already traded his life for the pitiful $4. . . . How many more of these men have perished for someone’s $21 profit? Or who knows how many innocent people in hospitals have died from transfusions containing contaminated blood?
Yes, who knows? No one! Blood is an unknown quantity. It is like accepting a coin and not having any way of determining whether or not it is counterfeit. And if errors in typing blood arc seldom blamed for the harm they do, it is still less likely that diseased blood transfusions will get their share of blaine. Statistics will never reveal the facts! But a tacit admission of this danger is seen in the statejnent of some Harvard doctors some time ago (1947) to the eilect that among those whose blood should not be used for transfusions are those who have received blood transfusions themselves or any kind of blood products.
AVI)at shall we say of the politicians who so loudly encourage blood transfusions but do nothing to stop such rackets? Of the medical fraternity in the reputable, high-class hospitals that are willing to take such chances with the1 lives that people entrust to their care? Of the sordid selfishness of the men that operate those blood banks? Yes, and of the miserable wretches that are willing to give disease to another just so they can “play the horses", keep a date, or get drunk? And one and all ignoring the dictum set forth by Dr. Wiener: "‘health must be perfect/’
The Alternatives
But perhaps you think that it is better to risk diseased, mistyped, unsanitary, stale, too much blood, etc., than certain death because of failure to have a blood transfusion. What are the comparative risks? Are blood transfusions “musts” or are there alternatives? and if so, what are they?
First of all, note what the system itself docs when it sustains loss of blood because of hemorrhage, accident, etc. Is the loss small? Then fully formed red cells, lield in reserve in the bone marrow for just such emergencies, rush out, replenish the supply, and there is no disturbance. Is the loss of blood large? Then a number of factors go to work. Fluids from the tissues and stomach enter the blood stream giving it the needed quantity so that the heart can keep up blood pressure. The patient feels thirst, calls for water and the moisture is replaced. Bipod cells rush out as need requires^ some not yet matured and oven some with their nuclei. (Something like a country at war using boys to fight after its manpower reserve has been depleted.) The sympathetic nervous system helps by causing the heart to beat faster and the blood vessels to constrict, thus helping to make the reduced supply of blood serve1 the purpose of life. And if the loss, is still greater these activities arc speeded up still mon1.
And what about outside help? Pectin and water has been used time and again instead' of blood without any cases of surgical shock after the operation. In 1916 a Dr. Bayliss reported using a six-percent acacia gum in a saline solution a thousand times without a single unfavorable result.
In 1947 the New7 York Tinies told of the report, of a retired Chemical Corp commander on “Periston”, a chemical substitute for blood plasma that the Germans had used during the war 300,000 times and on 40,000 different patients. The Ante rican Medical Association was studying the matter, but nothing more haa been heard of it since.
Under the heading "New Blood Aid Described”, the New York Times of November 30, 1949, reported a Mayo Clinic doctor as saying: "Dextran, aside,from its low cost, avoids some of the untoward effects of plasma in comparison with the use of whole blood. It removes the complications of transfusions which have been increasing as more is learned about blood grouping.” Note carefully that last sentence: "It removes the complications of transfusions which have been increasing as more is learned about blood grouping.”
In describing the new transfusion method whereby the blood is literally pumped into the artery, Dr. I. Page, of the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, stated: "In emergencies plain tap water or water with salt in it has been used with success.” Yes, just "plain tap water or water with salt in it”!
In his book Adventures in Blood Transfusion Bernheim, telling of the treatment for surgical shock in days gone by, such as keeping the patient warm, etc., adds: "Especially intravenous injections of salt solutions had the effect of restoring the patient to consciousness." And regarding their use today he states: "Salt solution is still used and is of great service. But, like everything else, it has its limitations which must be recognized.”
Alonzo J. Shadman, M.D., of Forest Hills, Massachusetts, however, does not restrict them in any such way. Writing in The Layman Speaks, of June 1948, he states:
1 have practiced medicine and surgery for <3ver forty years and never yet have I given a blood transfusion, nor fractionated blood, for any purpose, and I have never had a patient any the worse for not having received it, 1 have h^d many, many patients who were bled cold from accidental loss of blood and an infusion of normal saline solution always saved them.
... I have seen patients turn over in bed and die following blood transfusions. 1 have never seen an untoward reaction from, a needed saline transfusion. There are as many types of blood as there are persons living on this planet.
The foregoing examples clearly indicate that there are valuable arid practical substitutes for blood when the system is dangerously low in that vital fluid-It also makes it appear that the medical profession in discarding the simpler and safer methods for the one involving the greater risks is in effect straining out the gnat of salt solutions, etc., and swallowring the camel of mistyped and diseased blood. They willingly ignore the body’s marvelous blood-manufacturing facilities and extol their complicated and dangerous blood transfusion thei*apy.
To sum up: We have noted the campaign for blood donors and traced the history of blood transfusion from its inception to our day. We have noted transfusion methods and the uses made of blood. We have presented some of the risks and shown that there is a sordid racket in the blood traffic that stinks to the high heavens. And we have seen that there are alternatives for blood transfusions, and involving far l&ss risk.
But this is not all there is to this story. The foregoing matter may he considered as controversial, and on its merits alone each one can be free to choose for himself whether to take or refuse blood transfusions. However, hlood transfusion is tantamount to drinking blood, and God, in His Word the Bi hie, has very dearly shown Christians His'will regarding this matter on three different occasions: immediately after the deluge, to Noah and his family; to the members of the typical Theocracy, the nation of Israel, by His spokesman Moses; and to the followers of Christ by the decrees of the apostles to the early church. For proof see details in another article, “The Bible and Blood Transfusion,” on page 25 of this issue.
Plight of the
PALESTINE REFUGEES
By “Awake!” correspondent In Lebanon
EVERYBODY hoped that after the second world war the time had come which would bring peace to all men, peace which would have left them in their homes, on their lands, so as to live in freedom and happiness. This apparently was too good to be true, for shortly after the silencing of the guns in World War II the Arab-Jewish hostilities for control and occupation of the land of Palestine began. During the time it raged, news of it hit the headlines daily. But now another conflict has come to an end* Yes, an uneasy peace has settled over the land. But the story does not end here, for out of this fight nearly one million Palestinian Arabs ivere made refugees. Another shame which must be added to this world’s infamous record is the tragic plight of the Palestinian refugees!
Let us consider some of the events which ivere the causes for a whole populace to leave its home and country. The close of 1947 found Jews and Arabs each steeled for the critical moment that would mark the end of the British mandate. The Jews launched a successful campaign to secure new and effective arms from Europe and America, In time the Arabs found themselves confronted by a strongly armed opponent whom they were unable to match with their own resources. Many of the richer classes began leaving for neighboring Arab states, chiefly Lebanon.
Following a few minor skirmishes, the cauldron of war suddenly boiled over on December 30, 1947* A Jew dropped a bomb near the entrance of a petroleum refinery in the city of Haifa, resulting in a terrific explosion and the death of some Arab workers. In a quick exchange of violence, Jews at the company’s head-
quarters were slain
angry Arabs, and Jewish terrorists slaughtered the total population of the Arab village of Dayr Yaseen. Fear gripped the land, and a second, then a third group of Palestinians fled.
Thousands began pouring out of Palestine, exhausting all means of transportation and crowding every road. Many who were in possession of commercial vehicles took advantage of these poor people by charging them outrageous prices in helping them leave. Others not so fortunate had to substitute with camels and donkeys for transporting their quickly gathered things. Thousands began to settle in Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Iraq and Transjordan* Meanwhile the Jews made a swift attack on the city of Haifa on April 22, 1948, compelling all the non-Jewish inhabitants to flee the city in a short time, especially by the port of Haifa.
An Exodus in Panic
It was a pitiful sight indeed to see many thousands crowded at the port facing the,sea and waiting for boats to take them away. Fear and panic gripped the populace as each was thinking of himself or his own—when there was time to think at all. The boats transported this fourth group of refugees to the cities of South Lebanon. A boat would carry some members of a family and anchor at one port to discharge its contents, while another boat carrying other members of the same family unloaded them at a different port. It was a period of anxiety, agony and distress* Many families were scattered and broken up in the various countries. A fifth group fled Palestine' after the Arab armi.es failed in their liberation attempt. It is not easy to visualize the chaos caused by the displacement of virtually a million persons.
It is to be noted that there were three classes of people that left Palestine: the rich who managed to take some money with them, the middle or laboring class, and the poorest class with little of this world's goods. It is this latter class that presents the greatest problem.
On the arrival of the refugees, the Arab governments took upon themselves the responsibility of dealing with them. Arab committees were formed with the purpose of gathering food and supplies to Case their suffering. Many students and citizens joined in this, but they found that this was a great task and required more money than they were able to gather. This aid they gave continued until January of 1949, when the League of Red Cross Societies took charge and cared for the people with the money allotted to them by the U. N. The United Nations donated 32 million dollars for this purpose. After registering the refugees, rations were then issued. Their monthly rations consist of Hour, sugar, rice, lentils or beans, margarine or oil and other small items from time to time. Mothers with babies are given milk. If we stop to figure the value of these rations per individual it amounts to $2.00. This is certainly below the subsistence level, and one wonders how they continue to survive.
Many of the refugees have expressed dissatisfaction and disappointment with the way the Red Cross has handled things. Charges were made of graft and crookedness with in the Red Cross itself. Its directors and employees were accused of pocketing some of the money specially appropriated for the refugees.
Sheltered in a Refuge of Misery
If you could visit one of their refugee camps, you would be stricken by the tragedy of it: overcrowded tents, dirt floors, a few blankets, or perhaps a straw mat here and there for its fortunate owner to use at night But for a good picture of the condition these refugees are in, we quote from the magazine The Red Cross Worlds issue of March, 1949:
The plight of these refugees today is still tragic. For the most part they are living in conditions of extreme misery. While large numbers are in camps, in cx-army barracks, in former Armenian refugee compounds or tent villages, many others have -taken refuge in the towns or villages. Crowded conditions prevail everywhere. At Saida in the Lebanon, for instance, 10,000 refugees arc housed in a town whose normal population is 16,000. Private homes, shops, stables, garages, even the mosques teem with refugees. Certain Palestinians who managed to bring along some means have rented dwellings. Their funds’ being exhausted, they either are forced to vacate such dwellings, or they are selling what furniture they may possess to keep a roof over their heads. Members of the League Secretariat on recent inspect ion tours have observed families in such conditions, Houses and shacks, devoid of all furnishing, are crowded to cu parity. Other groups win? had been evicted had no choice other than to seek shelter in tents already overcrowded. Tents that should hold a maximum of ten persons are often found to ‘‘house’7 30 people! Army barracks filled to capacity afford the minimum of privacy; sections assigned to families arc partitioned off by suspended blankets. The result is a regrettable promiscuity, aggravated by the pro longed duration of such conditions. These people arrived ill-fed, cold, despairing of the present and of the future, wracked with illness and prey to any disease common to such excruciating conditions. They present a problem beyond adequate description.
Tn this year 1950 the situation remains practically unchanged. It is estimated that 120,(XX) Hed to Lebanon alone, the country bordering Palestine on the north. There, in a country already short of employment, they have struggled to eke out A bare existence. The United Nations is at present studying a works project whereby many of them may be put to work; however, nothing has been done yet.
A People in Need of Hope
It is easy to understand why most of these people today find themselves disillusioned and in a hopeless condition. Knowing that they were fifty times greater in number than their enemies, they thought for sure that it would have been but a few weeks before the Arah armies would come in and sweep the Jews out. Hardly any of them expected to be away longer than a few weeks, and hence some left with only what they had on their backs. The shopkeepers just closed their shops. The people locked the doors of their homes, leaving their houses in order, and fled. That is wTby many of the Jews who migrated to Palestine could walk right into a home with all of its comforts.
Many of the refugees had owned farms and had large investments in properties, stores and industries. Others had all their money tied up in real estate or equipment. Some who had savings in the bank did not even stop to take time to go draw it out before they left, larer to learn the banks hud frozen their money and it could not be withdrawn. One related how he and his family had worked hard for years for what they had acquired and in twenty-four hours lost everything.
What are the sentiments of these people toward others? For one thing, they blame their leaders for not fighting a united war. On the other hand, those who thought nobly of the United States have a changed attitude now due to the American war aid given the Jews. Neither is the president of the United States highly esteemed because of his appeal for the Jews in 1945, Nor are their feelings any better toward the United Nations since the decision to partition Palestine. As for the British, they are not trusted because of their habit of playing a double policy in the Near Fast.
Another significant factor has been the turning of many of these refugees from the Bible into unbelief. The reason for this is that some of Christendom’s clergy7 have passed out the idea that according to the Bible the Jew's are destined to go back to their former homeland, in fulfillment of prophecy. Since the Jews have achieved their goal in taking a part of Palestine, the Arab refugees consider the Bihle, especially the so-called "Old Testament’7, to be a Jewish book. So, with this erroneous teaching having penetrated their minds, they now come out against the Bible.
On the other hand, we find many of these good people are not throwing away or forsaking the Bible because of what happened to them. Many of good will among them are turning to the Bible and studying it, and getting the right understanding of the Scriptures as to how God will hring in a new world under the Kingdom rulership of His beloved Son, Christ Jesus, and in this knowledge they rejoice. They know they cannot put any real hope in any human ruler, nation or United Nations. Christ’s kingdom is the only hope for wandering refugees.
5sunlight “Batteries”
Pausing at the halfway mark in this twentieth century, scientists and engineers have taken time to look into the future and predict what it may bring forth, Among other things, they see the possibility of lighting the interior of homes at night with sunlight captured and stored up during the daytime. Such a thing is possible if a high percentage of special phospher powders is mixed in the paint, wallpaper or other interior finishing material. During the daylight hours the phospher is "charged” up with solar radiation which in turn is given o3 at night in the form of brilliant illumination.
The romantie South Sea islands have their own peculiar cus
toms regarding women. Polynesia is a name given to the myriads of tiny isles dotting the Pacific in a vast arc from New Zealand on the south to Hawaii and the Sandwich islands to the
north. The women inhabitants have a beautiful akin which they keep with pride through much washing and oiling. Their “soap” if? a kind of red earth that lathers somewhat in water. Life is not so busy and complicated in these tropic isles and the ladies can take their time for such things. If they uphold the feminine tradition of keeping the boy friend waiting, it is understandable there, for literally hours at a time are taken for the purpose of arranging one another’s hair. They even have a separate god for hairdressers and combers whoso aid is invoked by them while they are at their tasks. In most of the tribes marriages are arranged between the parents of the girl and a “John Alden middleman” sent by the wishful suitor. However, some tribes permit a girl to propose to a man of equal or inferior rank to herself, a privilege that Western women can supposedly exercise only every four years. Tahiti goes even further and will allow a woman who is superior to her husbaod’s rank to marry as many others as she chooses in addi
tion, while remaining the legal wife of the first.
In Melanesia, another large group of islands, the blood-chilling custom of “widow murder” has been handed down from of old in some islands. The basis for it as expressed in the Fijis is something like this: The superstitious natives believe that after death one must get by a certain bachelorhating guardian in the “afterworld”. It seems this watchman will accept only one proof that bis “customer” was married on earth, and that is the presence of his wife's ghost still in attendance on her husband. No male ghost will be allowed to pass without horrible treatment unless attended by a female ghost. To be sure that the wife will he able to leave with her husband, she must be slain immediately after his death and buried with him.
This brand of de monism similarly provides that the women must give proof to the “guardian” that they have been married. It is to be noted, however, that sho need only submit the beard of her husband to satisfy her inquisitor. Thus it is only necessary that her husband’s beard be shorn and buried with her, and be may go on living. Surely the
concocted
this religion.
men
Tn« Identity of the “Apelike Men"
Years ago, the so-called “scientists” picked up some old bones and put them together to form what they chose to call the Piltdown Man, the Neanderthal Man, the Java Man, etc., and which creatures they claimed lived hundreds of thousands of years ago as man’s ancestors. This highly unscientific job was no more completed when other “scientists*” came along and, with as much learning as the first lot, declared that these shabby, dreadful-looking apelike “men” were really “women”. Females rather than males! But confidentially, ladies, either conclusion is only a wild guess dangling in the thin air of speculation by imaginary threads of evidence flimsier than a one-day-old cohweb. All of this, however, points to one outstanding and irrefutable truth: the real apelike men are these evolutionary “scientists” that swing from theory to theory, from guess to guess, from limb to branch as they patch up or niter their mythical web of evolution.
A.ft elongated hut interesting ‘*1 du" rrremoo.v of Oriental origin
MIDNIGHT bamboo wedding! The invitation to us missionaries here in British Guiana to attend this colorful
Oriental affair thrills us. An eight-mile cycle ride after dusk over a bumpy country road out of Georgetown brings us to the spot where a five-hour ceremony is in process.
The hospitable hosts and guests alike immediately begin a running commentary on the proceedings. It is a Hindu marriage of two youthful East Indians, both natives of British Guiana. We are made to feel right at home as we mix into the crowd numbering nearly three hundred persons.
What is the first novelty that attracts our attention? An energetic dance resembling the hula-hula is being performed by a large company of men, friends of the groom—he has many friends on an occasion like this!—singing lustily in Hindustani and accompanied by the steady beating of small drums. No ballroom electric lights are here, but a bough has been cut from a tree and it is decorated with flaming coconuts as torchlights.
Simultaneously a few yards away a very quiet, intense ceremony is taking place. The central figures are seated cross-legged on the bare ground, surrounded by numerous onlookers. In the midst of this group, adorned by a pink robe of sateen (a jama), with a high tiara of imitation jewels and glittering bits of a mirror, is the “king for the day'1, the bridegroom himself. Operation
Dewar Puja is on, the uniting of the two families, or "the welcome at the door’; Our well-dressed ex-bachelor joins hands with the father of the bride while two pundits (Hindu priests), one representing each family, utter prayers in Hindustani, and then apply to the hands of both the father and the groom various leaves, petals of flowers, rice, sugar, and red powder, all of which have been ceremoniously passed through fire or water.
Meanwhile we are informed that two or three months earlier the bride’s parents decided that she had reached the marriageable age of fifteen. Many other girls are given away at the age of twelve. Having found a suitable partner (to them), the parents then introduce her to him at his home in the presence of some friends as witnesses. A pundit from each side consults his pattra, qt almanac, to determine the suitability of the parties to each other in accordance with planetary conjunctions. These conjunctions also regulate the date for tying the nuptial knot, which usually comes between February and June. One month is supposed to bring happiness, another spiritual blessings, another health, and so on. Although this Hindu tradition of adults’ arranging for their children’s life partners is centuries old, the present generation of East Indians in British Guiana is getting away from that method.
“Bamboo Wedding”
Following this initial meeting, Tilak is in order. This is the official engagement, in which the maiden’s father gives dowry to the future husband in the form of such gifts as money, clothing, etc. We have also missed the ceremony of cleansing or preparation that preceded the wedding night by two or three days. Since that occasion a bamboo pole has been planted in the front yard of each of the two homes, and it is around such that the actual union is solemnized; thus the term “bamboo wedding”.
There is the bamboo pole near the site of the bride's house, that tall pole forming the middle support of a small tent, with more bamboo poles covered with coconut leaves strung together. See the paper lanterns and water coconuts hanging beneath this improvised roof, as a fire burns constantly on the ground beneath ?
At the front entrance to the home, it is the bride’s mother's turn to do something. Yes, something they call parchhan, or the welcome of the mother-in-law. It consists of throwing fine dough balls and bits of rice over the groom's shoulder, and then saving enough to throw the same over her own shoulder into the crowd behind. The bride's eldest sister follows the same procedure. Each also hands gifts to the bridegroom and his father.
Refreshment time comes, and we guests partake of an Indian meal of pur ri (unleavened) bread, curried potatoes, rice and split peas, in a pleasing combination. Meanwhile the groom, pundits, and close friends have retired to a nearby borne where janivas is observed. In other words, this special group have some singing, dancing, and eating by themselves.
Here Comes the Bride!
As our wTatches indicate 11:30 p.m. we are told to ‘‘stand by”. The finale is approaching! The shy bride, who has spent most of the night inside her house, is now seated on a small bench under the bamboo. She doesn’t have a veil over her face; no, but a large white sheet is draped over her entire body, displaying only her daintily decorated toenails and her pretty painted fingernails! How strangely different from the elegant wedding gowns of North American brides! This “ghostly” appearing woman has consolation, however, in the many fine presents in gold and clothing that lie at her feet.
Next the “best man” steps into the picture. He is the groom’s eldest brother, and during a brief ceremony he is charged by a pundit to act as a father to the bride in case of the husband's death.
Exit the hidden Miss, obligingly leaving the tent while nervous Mr. enters. Then she re-enters and sits at her father’s right hand in readiness to be given in marriage. We are kindly given chairs, while the local guests sit ludian-fashion all around the outside of the tent. As nearly every word of importance is either spoken in or translated into English, we follow each step with interest.
The ever-present influence of religion is felt as offerings are made to the Hindu trinity deities, Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, while the young couple walk slowly around the “sacred” fire in the center of the bamboo tent, gradually extinguishing the embers by shaking a powdery substance onto them.
For the first time during this evening event the groom actually views the countenance of his bride as he joins her under her coverlet and sprinkles red powder in the parting of her hair. As she stands to his right, the pundit addresses them. This part of the ceremony is called satpadi. The woman agrees to the seven vows and states that she will now come to the man's left hand and become his lawfully wedded wife. Five promises are made by the bridegroom in return.
…