For more than four years, Chad Carswell, 38, has suffered from severe kidney disease. In July 2020, he started on dialysis — but now his kidneys are functioning at just 4 percent.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Carswell said he recently applied for a kidney transplant but was turned down because he has not received a coronavirus vaccine.
And, despite his hospital’s requirements that organ recipients be vaccinated against the virus, he’s refusing the shots.
Carswell, of Hickory, N.C., acknowledged his condition is a “ticking time bomb,” and said he’s living every day as though it’s his last.
Still, he will not take a coronavirus vaccine — even if that means losing out on a potentially lifesaving transplant.
“There is not a situation in this world that I’ll get a vaccine,” he told The Post.
“If I’m laying on my deathbed, and they tell me, ‘You have a kidney waiting on you if you get this shot,’ I’ll tell them, ‘I’ll see you on the other side.’”……..
Carswell said he knows that by refusing to get vaccinated, the donor kidney he so desperately needs will remain out of reach.
But he said he is willing to accept the consequences, even it costs him his life.
“I was born free,” Carswell added. “I’ll die free.”……
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/01/31/chad-carswell-kidney-coronavirus-vaccine/