RANCHO CUCAMONGA, Calif. — In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic in May 2020, Oliver Kellman’s heart and kidney failed. He required two transplants to survive.
When he went to the hospital on May 14, thinking he would probably need dialysis, he was told he needed a heart transplant within the next two or three weeks — or “you won’t make it in the middle of COVID,” Kellman, an attorney and lobbyist, recalled.
For Kellman, a 6-foot-4-inch-tall black man, the odds of finding a donor organ match were slim. The number of African Americans in need of organ transplants outpaces the number of black donors.
