The family of a man who came back to life while surgeons were preparing to remove his organs revealed tragic details that shocked American society.
In 2021, Thomas “TJ” Hoover II, now 36, was pronounced dead after an overdose landed him at Baptist Health in Richmond, Kentucky.
Donna Rohrer, his sister and primary caregiver, revealed that he began using drugs because of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, which developed after seeing dead bodies in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Earlier, Hoover lost two brothers to an overdose, and then his mother died. On her birthday, Hoover took unspecified medications and passed out. When paramedics arrived at his location, he had no pulse.
Days later, with doctors not seeing any signs of brain activity, Hoover’s family decided to remove him from life support and allow his organs to be removed for donation, in accordance with his wishes.
But when he was taken into the operating room, Hoover woke up, and since then, his story has spread across the country and appears to have led to a surge in people removing their names from organ donor databases.
An eyewitness from the medical team said that shortly after Hoover was taken to the operating room, he began to stagger, and she saw tears on his face as he shook his head, refusing to undergo the operation.
Despite the bleak prognosis from his doctors, Hoover was well enough to be able to accompany his sister home. But he still had difficulty with balance, speech and vision, and some limitations in his short-term memory.
The incident sparked a major controversy, with reports that the hospital’s medical staff contacted the organ donation organization and told officials about their concerns about Hoover’s condition, but insisted that the organs be removed.
The organization later denied these reports, stressing that it does not allow the extermination of living people.
In the one week since Hoover’s story was reported, about 170 people removed themselves from organ donor records, 10 times the number of people who removed themselves during the same period in 2023.
Representatives for Gift of Life Michigan, a Kentucky-based organ donation network, told The Associated Press that some of the people whose names were removed mentioned Hoover’s case specifically.
This adds further pressure to an already strained health system, with an estimated 17 people in the United States dying every day waiting for an organ transplant.
shafaq.com
