Asylum seeker highlights rights complications

The complications of catering for immigrant and asylum seeker rights in Ireland has been highlighted this week.

Back in september of this year a 'Ms K', a 23-year old woman from the Democratic Republic of Congo, gave birth to a healthy baby boy at the Coombe Maternity Hospital, Dublin, Ireland. But she subsequently suffered a massive haemorrhage, losing up to 80pc of her blood. The woman, a Jehovah's Witness refused a blood transfusion, forcing doctors to make an emergency application to the High Court.

The High Court ruled that doctors at the Maternity Hospital could force a seriously-ill Jehovah's Witness to have a blood transfusion despite her refusal on personal and religious grounds. Justice Henry Abbott was told the woman would die unless the procedure was authorised.
In a landmark but controversial ruling, the Master of the Coombe Maternity Hospital, Chris Fitzpatrick, was told that his staff could restrain the mother if she physically attempted to stop doctors administering the life-saving blood transfusion and clotting agent.
Justice Henry Abbott was told that she would die last night unless the procedure was authorised by the court.
The court was told that the emergency application was complicated by the fact that Ms K, who only speaks French, was fully "compos mentis" and had consciously made a decision refusing medical intervention. Judge Abbott accepted that if she were brought to court on a stretcher, she would oppose the application.
However, he said he would always take the side of life rather than death.
Judge Abbott said there was a risk to the life of the mother and an imminent threat to the genuine welfare of the child and he felt the court could and should intervene in such circumstances.
"The interests of that child is paramount in this situation," he said.
If Ms K died in the hospital as a result of the hospital authorities standing back and doing nothing the child would also have a potential legal action against the hospital, he said.

The Irish courts have previously made similar orders in respect of children whose parents have refused blood transfusions on their behalf, but this was the first time the High Court has made such an order against an adult who is refusing treatment.

Lawyers acting for the Coombe Hospital had warned that if the court did not intervene the baby boy would be left with no person in this country to look after him.
Gerard Hogan, SC, told the court: "I would respectfully say that, faced with the difficulties in which we are in this matter, there is a real risk that unless the court now does intervene the patient will slip into an irreversible coma and the baby will be left with no person in this country, as far as is known, to look after its welfare."

The decisioN outraged Ireland's Jehovah Witness community, who said the ruling by the High Court was "akin to rape".
"To force a blood transfusion on an adult who is flatly refusing treatment is akin to rape,"
"As far as we were concerned, the law in relation to adults was firmly established in Ireland and elsewhere. It smacks of medical paternalism. Does this ruling mean that every adult, and not just Jehovah Witnesses, will have this threat of doctor knows best hanging over their heads if they refuse treatment? said Brendan Farrell of the Dublin hospital liaison committee.
"If she wakes up and discovers that she has had a blood transfusion against her will, it will have a devastating impact on her spiritual welfare," said Mr Farrell.

The Association of Irish Humanists branded the ruling a dangerous precedent.
"It is incredible that the decision of a mature adult can be overruled in this way, said its vice-chairman, Dick Spicer. "They are treating her like a child, individual choice has been extinguished."

The case continued this week as Ms K told the High Court she believed a transfusion was a transgression of "an order from God'' and she was "prepared to die'' for her faith.
The 24-year-old French-speaking woman from the Congo, known as Ms K, became distressed while giving evidence in the continuing action by the Coombe Women's Hospital for court orders that it was entitled to apply in September 2006 for a court injunction allowing it to transfuse her against her wishes.

Examined by her counsel, Mr John Rogers SC, and speaking through a translator, Ms K said today that, after she haemorrhaged, she was told by hospital staff a transfusion was the only solution that would save her life.
She said she had refused a transfusion several times, telling the doctors she was an adult and did not want a transfusion.
She accepted it was "no joke" when a doctor gives a warning that a person's life is in danger.
However, because of her Jehovah Witness faith, she did not want any blood and was "prepared to die".
She had told the doctors that, for her, having a transfusion was a transgression of "an order from God" in the Bible.
It was "breaking the rules" because it was "written in the Bible that we should not accept blood or blood products".
"I had to accept that order and it was me who had to make that decision." She was born and had grown up under that principle, she added.
She wanted to make hospital staff understand that she was not happy to have a transfusion, she felt "abused and dirtied". This was a moment where she had to choose "between reality and lies".
"I would choose reality for God," she said.
Asked what she found "offensive" about the transfusion, she said it was because she was made transgress something at the "bottom of her beliefs" and because the doctors were not 100% sure the blood was good for the person.
She still cannot forget the blood is in her, she said. "It really hurts."
She had become a Jehovah Witness in 1995 and her father, who had converted from Catholicism, was an elder in the Jehovah Witness faith.

Ms K was giving evidence on the 28th day of the action by the hospital arising from its securing a court order on September 21 2006 allowing it administer a transfusion to her.
The hospital sought the order after Ms K lost some 80% of her blood following a difficult birth and has told the court staff were not informed she was a Jehovah Witness until after the emergency arose.

The hospital contends Ms K's constitutional rights to freedom of conscience and the free practice of religion did not allow her to decline appropriate medical treatment.
She denies the claims and, in a counter-claim, contends the transfusion was a breach of her rights and constituted assault and trespass on her person.

Earlier, Ms K told Mr Rogers she came here in April 2006 to have her child because of the good medical care and doctors here.
She had previously lost three pregnancies and, in Africa, being childless was considered an "abomination". She applied for asylum because she was "desperate to save my baby."
She had given her religion as Catholic to the Coombe and Sligo General hospitals in order to be consistent with the details in her application for asylum.
Mrs K claimed to be Catholic because it was known that Jehovah Witnesses are politically neutral, she said.
On the day of the medical emergency, she said medical staff told her she required a blood transfusion.
She said that, through a friend and translator in both French and English, she consistently said she did not want any blood or blood products.

Ms K said she had a conversation with the Master of the Coombe, Dr Chris Fitzpatrick, but he was "not very happy" with her answers. She was upset when the blood transfusion went ahead against her wishes.
She had told staff that her husband was back in the Congo, when he was actually in Ireland, because she was afraid that if she told the truth he could be arrested, she said.
Ms K agreed she had told social workers some days after the medical emergency that she had become a Jehovah's Witness in Ireland in the weeks before giving birth. This was in order to be consistent with her asylum application, she said.
She could not recall telling the social workers she had thanked Dr Fitzpatrick in a conversation with him several hours after the transfusion occurred.

The case, before Ms Justice Mary Laffoy, continues.

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Asylum seeker highlights rights complications