How do Protestants counteract the Witnesses stance on Blood Transfusions? As discussed in Jehovah&#39;s Witnesses and blood transfusions Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions for reasons in scripture.  I have trouble with the idea. What about the sanctity of life with scriptures such as:

Deuteronomy 30:19 (ESV)


  I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live


How do Protestants (Church of England for example) counteract the Witnesses stance on Blood Transfusions?
The Jehovah’s Witness publication ‘What Does the Bible Really Teach?’ discusses the issue of blood transfusions in Chapter 13.  Paragraph 11 reads:

We show respect for blood by not eating it...  Jehovah’s view was clear: His servants could eat animal meat but not the blood. They were to pour the blood on the ground—in effect, returning the creature’s life to God.

They quote Leviticus 17:13-14 to support this. It’s a pity they don’t quote verse 15 as well then they would see the context:

“Anyone, whether native-born or alien, who eats anything dead or torn by wild animals must wash his clothes and bathe with water and he will be ceremonially unclean till evening then he will be clean. But if he does not wash his clothes and bathe himself he will held responsible.”

Why is this verse even there? Because in times of distress, for example in war, it might become necessary to eat an animal that had not been slaughtered the kosher-way. Why? To save lives! Although it was against the law to eat un-clean animals at times it was necessary.  Paragraphs 12 to 15 in Chapter 13 of the ‘Bible Teach’ book continues:

So we must ‘keep abstaining from blood.’ In God’s eyes, our doing that is as important as our avoiding idolatry and sexual immorality. Does the command to abstain from blood include blood transfusions? Yes. To illustrate: Suppose a doctor were to tell you to abstain from alcoholic beverages. Would that simply mean that you should not drink alcohol but that you could have it injected into your veins? Of course not! Likewise, abstaining from blood means not taking it into our bodies at all. So the command to abstain from blood means that we would not allow anyone to transfuse blood into our veins.
14 What if a Christian is badly injured or is in need of major surgery? Suppose doctors say that he must have a blood transfusion or he will die. Of course, the Christian would not want to die. In an effort to preserve God’s precious gift of life, he would accept other kinds of treatment that do not involve the misuse of blood. Hence, he would seek such medical attention if that is available and would accept a variety of alternatives to blood.
15 Would a Christian break God’s law just to stay alive a little longer in this system of things? Jesus said: “Whoever wants to save his soul [or, life] will lose it; but whoever loses his soul for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 16:25) We do not want to die. But if we tried to save our present life by breaking God’s law, we would be in danger of losing everlasting life. We are wise, then, to put our trust in the rightness of God’s law, with full confidence that if we die from any cause, our Life-Giver will remember us in the resurrection and restore to us the precious gift of life.

They use Acts 15 to support their claim that true Christians should not have a blood transfusion – is that right? No. The issue in Acts 15 is that the Jews and Gentiles had been saved through the grace of Jesus. The Jews however where trying to get the Gentiles to uphold the Mosaic Law. When the Gentiles refused to, this caused a problem. James is trying sort it out by asking the Gentiles to abstain from these things so as to not upset their Jewish brothers. We see in other chapters in Acts and Romans that our salvation has nothing to with circumcision or food, or blood, but for the sake of the Jewish brothers of the time they were to abstain from these things in order not to stumble them. Of course this has nothing to do with blood transfusions in spite what the Watchtower teaches in the 'Bible Teach' book.
Paragraph 18 declares that true Christians are not under the Mosaic Law and it is only by means of faith in the merit of Jesus’ shed blood that we can gain salvation.  Amen to that.  So why do the preceding paragraphs in chapter 13 claim that true Christians gain everlasting life through upholding the laws of the Watchtower, which include refusing to have a blood transfusion?
Jesus said: “I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life” (John 5:24).  No need to obey man-made laws.  No need to twist Scripture in an attempt to uphold man-made laws.  Jesus said nothing about refusing to accept a blood transfusion.  That is how this Protestant Christian counteracts the Jehovah’s Witness stance on blood transfusions.