The mother had just given birth, and a nurse prepared to administer the shot before both parents objected. The nurse deemed this to be medical neglect, and walked out of the delivery room with the newborn infant. Thankfully, the parents were reunited with their new child 12 hours later. And now those parents are suing, and it’s fairly certain that they’ll receive a sizable settlement for what amounted to kidnapping, and an unimaginable degree of emotional distress for the mother and father. Hopefully the costly litigation will send a message to other hospitals to respect the wishes of their patients, and above all, not to kidnap newborns.
Doctors like to spring the vitamin K shot onto parents shortly after a child is born, giving them almost no time to make an informed decision. The shot is sold as a completely safe way to protect a newborn’s blood-clotting ability in the event of an accident, but the truth isn’t so innocent. The vitamin K shot, phytonadione, contains polysorbate 80, benzyl alcohol, and aluminum. These three ingredients have been implicated in a host of neurological issues later in life, yet it is apparently fine to administer to a minutes-old infant. Aside from this, a baby doesn’t begin developing its own vitamin K until 8 days after birth for a host of reasons crucial to the child’s survival and development.
This is more than adequate to rationally refuse the shot at birth. But in a world with strict protection and enforcement of parental rights, no justification is needed other than a firm ‘No’.
