An Australian mother yesterday won her bid to breastfeed her baby after a court overturned a decision banning her from suckling the infant due to the risk of infection from tattoos.
The 20-year-old mother, who cannot be named, was ordered not to breastfeed her 11-month-old son earlier this month by a judge concerned about the risk of him contracting HIV or other diseases from two new tattoos.
However, the full bench of the Family Court on Friday unanimously reversed the decision, ruling that the evidence “was not capable of establishing the risk identified.”
The case first came before Judge Mathew Myers on June 3 when the mother complained that the father, from whom she is separated, had failed to return the baby to her care.
At that hearing, the judge raised the fact that the mother was breastfeeding in relation to evidence that she was taking medication for post-natal depression.
She had also used cannabis once in the past two years and had acquired two new tattoos on her foot and finger about a month ago.
In a decision on June 5 Myers said that while the mother had tested negative for HIV and other diseases since getting the tattoos, tests could not be definitive until three months after the needles were used.
In his decision, he said looking at the benefit of breastfeeding an 11-month-old compared to the risk of “a lifelong issue in circumstances where the child contracted HIV,” it was in the child’s best interests not to be breastfed.
However, in its judgment on Friday, the full bench of Australia’s Family Court said the case highlighted the need for expert opinion evidence in such instances.
“Judges must not mistake their own views for being either facts not reasonably open to question or as appropriately qualified expert evidence,” Justice Murray Aldridge said in a judgment summary.
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Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
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