Death caused partly by malpractice and partly religious refusal

[Eugene Volokh]

    Rozewicz v. N.Y. City Health & Hosp. Corp., 1997 WL 177687 (N.Y.
Sup. Feb. 18), discusses a wrongful death claim in which a defense is
that plaintiff would have survived had she had a blood transfusion.
Plaintiff refused the transfusion on religious grounds.

    The judge's opinion canvasses the precedents, and concludes that
the defendants may argue assumption of risk:  That the decedent may
have "expressly assumed the risk of any conscious pain and suffering
[and wrongful death] by refusing to submit to blood transfusions."


                               -- Eugene Volokh, UCLA Law