A woman is distraught over a hospital's decision to keep her away from her ill mother because she was not vaccinated against COVID.
Elena Pauly is decrying the health policies of Vancouver General Hospital, where her mother, Margarete has been confined in the facility's acute care floor after being moved from the Willow Pavilion, a long-term care facility associated with Vancouver Coastal Health. Margarete has COVID and began aspirating on Friday night, prompting her transfer to acute care. Now, Vancouver General Hospital is preventing her daughter from seeing her due to her vaccination status.
"You can go to a restaurant, you can go to the theater, you can go out anywhere," Pauly told Faithwire on Monday afternoon, adding that she was able to get to the door of her mother's room on Sunday night before being stoped by staff and asking her to leave because she was not vaccinated against COVID.
"My mother's triple vaccinated, she has COVID, so I'm not sure what we're worried about," Pauly remarked. "Shouldn't it be my consent if I would like to be around somebody who has COVID?"
Margarete has Parkinsons and was recently diagnosed with cancer and COVID. Pauly, who is Margarete's adopted daughter from Siberia, said she was taken aback by the lack of compassion of the hospital staff. Because she was not allowed to see her mother face to face, Pauly was allowed to briefly FaceTime her mother, which she said was an "extremely painful" experience.
"She's out of it. She doesn't understand what's going on," Pauly said through tears. "She can't even focus on the FaceTime, really. I just kept on saying, 'I love you, I love you.' And that was it. It's been really, really hard."
Pauly argued that it was absolutely disheartening to see the discrepancies in Vancouver Coastal Health's hospital policies. She recounted how her aunt and uncle flew to Vancouver from Edmonton and were allowed to see Margarete for several days in a row despite them having been on a crowded plane. Pauly said they were vaccinated but that the COVID vaccines did not completely prevent transmission.
Pauly's close friend Brooke was also permitted to visit her father who was recovering from open-heart surgery despite her not having had a COVID vaccine. When Brooke confronted the nurses about it, they failed to clearly explain why she was allowed to see her father and Pauly was not allowed to see her mother.
As per Vancouver Coastal Health's FAQs page, the institution's "vaccination requirement does not apply to...visits for compassionate care, including critical illness, palliative care, hospice care, end-of-life and medical assistance in dying...visits paramount to the patient's physical and mental well-being...[and] visits to support the patient's decision-making."
Pauly is Margarete's power of attorney, her next of kin, and also shares decision-making responsibilities with her aunt. She also believes that her presence is critical for her mother's "physical and mental well-being."
"The lack of compassion yesterday - they don't know who I am, they don't know anything about me - but the fact that one person can be the gatekeeper and say, 'No, you can't come in. I'm going to escort you out,' was beyond me," Pauly remarked.
In the U.S., Florida Legislature has passed a bill that allows people to see their loved ones in health facilities regardless if there is a health crisis such as a pandemic, NPR reported. Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is expected to sign it in the coming weeks.
