Written by: @kristenshylin_
A 46-year-old man’s life was cut short when St. David’s South Austin Medical Center refused treatment due to his disability.
Michael Hickson, a quadriplegic, contracted COVID-19 and pneumonia at his nursing home, Daily Mail reported.
On June 11, Hickson transferred to the Austin medical center for treatment, but he never received treatment.
Hickson’s wife, Melissa, recorded two conversations with her husband’s doctor, who told her that treatment would not improve her husband’s quality of life due to his condition.
“Will treatment affect his quality? Will it improve his quality of life,” the doctor asked. “And the answer is no.”
When Melissa questioned why being able to live would not improve her husband’s current quality of life, the physician responded, “There’s no improvement with being intubated, with a bunch of lines and tubes in your body, and being on a ventilator for more than two weeks.”
Because Hickson did not receive treatment, he died six days after being admitted. Following Hickson’s death, Melissa uploaded the recordings of her conversation with the doctor on Youtube.
In the video, you could hear the doctor telling Melissa that patients who received treatment with medication were “walking and talking.”
Melissa shared with KVUE that the staff’s ableist statements surprised her, Daily Mail reported.
“The reason we go to hospitals is to be treated, and it is not to be based on a scale of whether or not you’re disabled or anything else,” she added.
Although St. Davids’s chief medical officer denied discriminatory acts against Hickson’s disability, the video clearly proved that the patient’s condition played a role in the hospital’s decision to halt treatment.
Melissa’s video caught the attention of ethicists and disability rights activists who condemned the staff’s actions.
“Whenever you say quality of life, that is completely subjective, and is about whether I think this person deserves to live or not live,” Texas Right-To-Life representative Kimberlyn Schwartz told KVUE.
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