News In Brief

Parents can't refuse transfusion, judge rules

State Supreme Court Justice Howard Levitt has ruled that the parents of a premature baby cannot, on religious grounds, refuse blood transfusions demanded by doctors to save the infant's life.

A Long Island hospital requested Monday's court hearing after the baby's father, Marco Quintana of Queens, told the hospital not to give the infant any more transfusions. The father said at the hearing that, as Jehovah's Witnesses, he and his wife opposed the treatment.