Octavio Estevez, Homeless Dad Kept Off Organ Waiting List, Gets New Apartment

A homeless dad who was told that he couldn't get a kidney transplant because he was homeless, got the keys to a new Manhattan home Saturday, CBS reports.

Octavio Estevez, 54, suffered strokes in 2006 that kept him from working as a tailor, according to NYDailyNews.com. The Dominican-born U.S. citizen landed in a Bronx homeless shelter and was diagnosed with end-stage renal disease two years ago. He needed a kidney transplant to save his life.

But, because the father of two was living in a shelter, Mount Sinai Medical Center kept him off its kidney transplant waiting list.

"If being poor is bad, being poor and ill is a tragedy," Estevez told VoicesofNY.org.

When city leaders learned of Estevez's plight, they banded together with the housing authority to find a solution.

"We're able to come together and actually create that home that he'll able to have once he has his transplant to come back to," Yvonne Stennett, who runs the Community League of the Heights, told CBS.

Estevez got the keys to a Washington Heights apartment on Saturday.

"I know that in this city where there is so much bad, people are also trying to good," Estevez told CBS.

Comments

[Aliceann Marquiess]

12:18 AM on 12/28/2011

Troll or @$$h0le?

[cryingliberty]

06:38 AM on 12/28/2011

Yes.

[gerald1961]

07:12 PM on 12/27/2011

If you are poor you do not deserve a chance to live. Keep voting for the GOP/Teabagger slime and soon there will not be any poor people alive.

[wesx]

04:15 PM on 12/27/2011

If you see homeless dad please tell him at his earliest convienionce to come by the hospital and pick up his kidney otherwise we will give it to little sally. Just kidding but sometimes they only have hours to get people in for these transplants and cannot wonder the streets to find people.

[ConservativeAlways]

11:11 AM on 12/27/2011

"Homeless dad" - this means he has kids; where are they living and more importantly, why isn't HE living with them?

[CPNASH]

08:03 PM on 12/26/2011

This is the US. if you don't have $ you simply don't exist.

[frankg3400]

02:39 PM on 12/26/2011

To all the people posting here how horrible transplant centers are, it's all about money, about it being racist etc. are missing the entire point. There is a major shortage of organs!!!

http://www­.unos.org/

There are 72,645 people actively on the Transplant waiting list.
There were 21,354 Transplant­s as of today.
There were only 10,558 Organ donors as of today.
Do you see how few organs there are compared to transplant patients? They are extremely rare, so there are guidelines as to who will most likely survive a transplant because of the organ shortage. To all of you who are complaining are you and your family members donating your organs after death to help the organ shortage and these patients? If not I suggest you start walking the walk and become an organ donor so there would be an over abundance of organs instead of a shortage and then the strict criteria because of the shortages might not be so tight.

[ms04121966]

08:44 AM on 12/26/2011

Not all Americans are into big Christmas shopping.

[bootxpp]

08:06 AM on 12/26/2011

I don't know why but I look at the name: Octavio Estevez and the first thing that comes into my mind is......hispanic vote???

[bdcelina777]

08:56 AM on 12/26/2011

Typical GOP/TP response.

[bootxpp]

12:22 PM on 12/26/2011

I get cynical when ever the Government blows its trumpet and announces its going to do a good deed----with are hard earned tax dollars----you have to remember the left wing Dem's of New York are in bed with the left wing America Media and this looks to me like some coordinated effort by both to paint the left wing Dem's as having a heart especially for those making up their voter base. By the way all this makes me more of a libertarian as I think the people can look out better for one another then the Government ever could. You have to remember private charities use to take care of those in need at the turn of the last century, till the Government realized there was potential votes in doing charitable works-----and put all of em out of business!!!

[ConservativeAlways]

10:52 AM on 12/27/2011

Typical DEM/OM response

[Pennsanic]

09:09 AM on 12/26/2011

If he were a white guy would you be thinking...white vote?

[nastymeanoldwhiteman]

07:28 AM on 12/26/2011

Would you donate to an organization that provides a service but would refuse you those same services if you ever had a need for those services.??? Happens everyday in the USA. Americans are denied lifesaving organ donation all the time simply because they don't have good healthcare insurance or can't afford those services, but they do make good donor Candidates. How did Ron Paul put it during his CNN debate.???

[alans0222]

07:45 AM on 12/26/2011

Simply not true but if that's what you believe, then go with it.

[americanhero]

07:28 AM on 12/26/2011

Why does it say "dad" in the headline? Are his kids homeless too? Where is his homeless wife? Is needing a kidney the only thing that qualifies you for a free apartment in Manhattan?

[Robert Frank]

07:19 AM on 12/26/2011

discrimination in this country? no way man...I'm simply underwhelmed with surprise

[alans0222]

06:50 AM on 12/26/2011

There are approx 70,000 people waiting for kidneys. There are approx 14,000 transplants done a year, nearly half come from cadavers. There is an average 5 year wait. Get listed in mulitple states if you can. If we can get people to be donors, then people would not die everyday waiting for organs.

[Al Schrader]

06:05 AM on 12/26/2011

I'm not a medical doctor, but I've never heard of a kidney disease you could catch. There is one genetic type that attacks the nephrils, but it's very rare. But, I'm sure that alcohol, nicotine, canabis, lysergic acid, pcps, or other substances will damage kidney and liver cells.

[Jafafa Hots]

06:47 AM on 12/26/2011

Yep, you're not a medical doctor.

[alans0222]

06:52 AM on 12/26/2011

Diabetes, high blood pressure, infections, can all affect the kidneys.

[ddbbmm13]

05:38 AM on 12/26/2011

What's wrong with Mt Sinai? Keeping someone off the list because they live in a shelter.
So if you are down on your luck, just go and die?
That's disappointing.

[Jafafa Hots]

06:48 AM on 12/26/2011

That's the American way. Health care for poor people is socialism! Or was it Islamo-communism? I forget...

[ms04121966]

08:54 AM on 12/26/2011

The city (government) has given him an apartment so that he can be on the transplant list. What are you doing to help him?

[ddbbmm13]

05:25 PM on 12/26/2011

Economic discrimination.
If this is the way they run the transplant program, I'm tearing up my donor card.

[Hetneo]

07:57 AM on 12/26/2011

While I think that it is not meritorious policy I can see probable logic behind it. They presume that homeless person have no resources for proper post transplant care, and that due to worse than bad living conditions various complications will ensue shortly after release from hospital, and that transplanted kidney will go to waste and not save anyone's life.

I'm not saying that this is good logic, it is very bad logic in my opinion. I'm just stating what I see as most likely reason for this policy.

[liephman88]

05:29 AM on 12/26/2011

To read some of these comments I'm guessing many here don't understand how no matter where you are in life something can come along and kick you to the curb. This man had suffered a stroke and no longer could perform his job as a taylor so he ended up in the street, the very same thing could happen to you. I know for a fact because it happened to me, I went from living in a cottage on the water to living on the street in the city sleeping in a cardboard box behind a temp labor company so I could get there every morning to hopefully get an indoor job out on the 20 degree weather just to earn $24 a day. I never begged for food or money but it took some time to get back on my feet and it took a kind act to help me out. But to hear some here you could give a rats butt because the issue of the homeless is "SO TIRESOME" .