More Hospitals Denying Transplants Over Vax Status

Cleveland, OH — The Cleveland Clinic’s motto is: “Every Life Deserves World Class Care.”

Apparently, every life doesn’t include those who haven’t submitted to a COVID-19 jab as the clinic has recently denied lifesaving organ transplants to two patients.

“I don’t think they do care. I mean, I feel bad because my grandkids, they say, ‘Grandma, we’ve been praying for you to get better.’ And it just breaks my heart because now I’ve got to tell them that I can’t get the liver, so I may not get better,” Michelle Vitullo told a Fox-affiliate in Cleveland after her liver transplant from her daughter, Angela Green, was cancelled because both have not taken a shot.

“I became a widow 29 years ago, and I got remarried to (Mike) 19 years ago. I don’t want to be a widow again,” said Debi Ganim, according to a Fox News report, after her husband Mike Ganimhad his kidney transplant delayed days before the surgery was to take place. In his case, Ganimhas taken the jab but his living donor has not.

This unethical and immoral practice from hospitals is starting to become a trend. As the Liberty Loft reported earlier this month, Jaimee Fougner was denied a kidney transplant from her friend Leilani Lutali by the University of Colorado Hospital because of their vax status.

For Vitullo, she has stage 4 liver disease. Her husband, Jim, said she began treatment at the Cleveland Clinic in 2019 and they’ve been following every rule placed on them by the hospital since then. However, the entire family has opposed the jab on religious grounds as well as for medical reasons citing the high number of adverse reactions to the shots.

Green learned that she was a good match for her mom, and the family was told at the end of September that the transplant surgery was ready to take place.

“It was a match, and it was a dream come true. My family was so excited, and it was a go…. Then we get the news that we are taken off the list and that we can’t do it without vaccination, and it was heartbreaking,” Green said.

Mike Ganim, now 52, has suffered from polycystic kidney disease since he was 27 which causes immense pain and cysts to form on his kidney. He almost died from the disease in March of 2020 and later that year was put on the organ transplant list.

The Ganim’s used social media to try and find a donor, and Sue George responded in June of this year and was confirmed as a match in August. The transplant was scheduled to occur on Oct. 13, but five days prior, on Oct. 8, the Cleveland Clinic cancelled the surgery because of George’s vax status.

Debi Ganim said: “She told them all along she’s not vaccinated and asked if this was going to be a problem. The answer was no. The answer was no because Mike is vaccinated and that was more important.”

George said: “We were blindsided. I don’t want to get the vaccine…. I’ve got reasons — medical, religious and also freedom.”

Life Site News reported on both cases. Both the Cleveland Clinic and University Hospitals in Cleveland are denying transplants based on vax status.

“Cleveland Clinic has recently developed safety protocols for solid organ transplantation that require COVID-19 vaccination to be an active transplant candidate or living donor. Vaccination is particularly important in these patients for their safety. For the living donor, preventing COVID-19 infection around the time of a surgical operation is crucial. For the transplant candidate, in addition to a major operation, medications taken after an organ transplant weaken a person’s immune response,” the hospital said in a statement.

Nathaniel Stewart, an attorney, wrote for The Federalist that decisions like this undermine the credibility of hospitals.

“The Cleveland Clinic appears prepared to condemn some of their patients to death over an experimental vaccine with a short track record,” Stewart wrote. “Its decision to forge ahead despite organ shortages smells of rank political kowtowing rather than care and treatment in their patients’ best interests. The new policy contravenes recent guidance from the American Medical Association advising doctors that ‘A patient’s vaccination status in and of itself is not sufficient reason, ethically, to turn that individual away.’”

Stewart added that “the Cleveland Clinic has shown a reckless disregard for the life of at least one of its transplant patients. Should the tragic facts of Ganim’s case ever be presented to a jury of his peers, perhaps they will tell us whether the hospital’s heartless manipulation is rooted in political self-interest, blind stupidity, or malevolent hubris—an uncomfortable choice that the country should never have to make.”

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