The Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses has announced a significant adjustment to the organisation’s position on blood, allowing individual members to decide according to personal conscience whether to accept or donate four main blood components.
The announcement was made on Friday, September 18, 2026, through an official statement issued from the organisation’s World Headquarters in Warwick, New York.
Under the revised position, Jehovah’s Witnesses may personally decide whether to accept red blood cells, white blood cells, plasma or platelets derived from another person’s blood during medical or surgical treatment.
The organisation also said individual Witnesses may decide whether to donate blood specifically for the purpose of producing components or fractions that could be used in treating another person.
According to the organisation, these decisions are now matters of individual conscience, and congregations are not to become involved in such personal medical decisions.
However, the announcement made clear that the longstanding position against whole-blood transfusions remains unchanged.
“The long-standing refusal of whole-blood transfusions on religious grounds, a core teaching based on the command to ‘abstain from blood’ (Acts 15:20), is unchanged,” the organisation said.
The latest adjustment follows another significant change announced by the Governing Body in March 2026 concerning the use of a person’s own blood.
In that earlier clarification, Jehovah’s Witnesses were told that the decision to have their own blood removed, stored and later returned to them during medical or surgical care was a matter for individual conscience.
The September announcement extends that principle of individual decision-making to the four primary components of blood obtained from another person.
Jehovah’s Witnesses said their position is based on their interpretation of Biblical commands to “abstain from blood” and their belief that blood represents life. At the same time, the organisation said it accepts medical treatment and that decisions involving the four primary blood components are now matters for each individual Witness and their conscience.
The organisation said it has more than nine million members worldwide across more than 200 countries and territories.
