Jun Ji-hye, a reporter at the finance desk of The Korea Times, focuses primarily on economic policy and government agencies, mainly covering the Ministry of Finance and Economy, the Ministry of Budget and Planning, the National Tax Service and the Korea Customs Service. She previously covered financial authorities, including the Financial Services Commission and the Financial Supervisory Service, and earlier worked on the political, city and business desks, reporting on a wide range of issues.
Man left brain-dead after vaccination donates organs
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By Jun Ji-hye
By Jun Ji-hye
A 57-year-old man, who was declared brain-dead after collapsing around two weeks following being inoculated with Johnson & Johnson single-dose COVID-19 vaccine, donated organs to four people. Meanwhile, his daughter called on the government to clarify the causality between her father's death and the vaccine.
In a petition posted on the Cheong Wa Dae website Oct. 22, the daughter claimed that her father, who died Oct. 10, had been healthy before receiving the vaccine, though he had undergone heart valve surgery 33 years ago.
According to the daughter, the man, who received the vaccine shot Sept. 17, was rushed to a hospital after collapsing Oct. 6. He was diagnosed with a cerebral infarction there and underwent emergency brain surgery, but was eventually declared brain-dead.
“My father died and later donated his organs to four people. Medical workers at the hospital said that they were not sure if an autopsy could find out the exact cause of my father's death,” the daughter wrote in her petition. “What I want is not compensation, but the government's efforts to clarify the causality between my father's death and the vaccination, as well as a sincere apology.”
She criticized the hospital's “indolent” response to the patient, who may have been suffering an abnormal reaction after the vaccination. She urged the government to notify people of the seriousness of vaccine-related side effects, rather than only asking people to participate in the country's inoculation program.