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Hospital refusing heart transplant for man who won't get vaccinated
Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston says its policy won't allow DJ Ferguson to have the surgery since not being vaccinated seriously hurts its chances for success and his long-term outlook.
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A Boston hospital says it won't consider performing a heart transplant on a patient who refuses to get vaccinated against COVID-19, CBS Boston reports.
DJ Ferguson, 31, is fighting for his life at Brigham and Women's Hospital and in desperate need of a heart transplant.
His father, David Ferguson, is speaking out passionately on behalf of his son who, he told CBS Boston, "has gone to the edge of death to stick to his guns and he's been pushed to the limit."
DJ's family says he was at the front of the line to receive a transplant but hospital policy stipulates that he's no longer eligible because he hasn't received the vaccination. And David Ferguson says his son simply won't.
"It's kind of against his basic principles — he doesn't believe in it," David Ferguson says. "It's a policy they are enforcing and so, because he won't get the shot, they took him off the list (for) a heart transplant."
Brigham and Women's released a statement saying, "Like many other transplant programs in the United States — the COVID-19 vaccine is one of several vaccines and lifestyle behaviors required for transplant candidates in the Mass General Brigham system in order to create both the best chance for a successful operation and also the patient's survival after transplantation."
Dr. Arthur Caplan, the head of medical ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, explains that being vaccinated is necessary for this type of procedure.