The Court exercised its parens patriae jurisdiction to authorise the administration of blood products to a 17-year-old Gillick-competent Jehovah's Witness during elective surgery, notwithstanding her and her parents' religiously-motivated refusal of consent. The Court held that the plaintiff's proposed standard — authorising transfusion when 'necessary to mitigate the risk' of death or neurological damage — was preferable to relying solely on s 174 of the Care Act, which requires 'urgency' to save life or prevent serious damage, because the statutory threshold could force clinicians to delay intervention until it is too late. The Court reconciled the approaches of Parker J and Hammerschlag CJ in Eq, holding that s 174 is a relevant consideration in the parens patriae jurisdiction but the availability of a statutory defence to the doctor is not determinative, and that the marginal additional intrusion on the minor's autonomy beyond the constraint already imposed by s 174 was outweighed by the clinical benefits of the more responsive test.
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