Hospital Sued for Wrongful Death After Patient Denied Ivermectin

A victory would set a precedent that could protect patient rights into the future.

A wrongful death lawsuit has been filed by the family of a woman who died after a hospital refused to treat her COVID-19 with ivermectin despite a doctor’s prescription.

Scott Mantel, whose wife, Deborah Bucko, died on May 16, 2021, at Mount Sinai Hospital from COVID-19 complications, filed the lawsuit in September, alleging that the hospital “repeatedly interfered with the doctor-patient relationship between Ms. Bucko and the infectious disease attending physician overseeing her treatment, specifically, by knowingly and deliberately impeding the doctor’s orders to treat Ms. Bucko with the potentially life-saving med.” A request for comment was not returned by the hospital.

According to the complaint, Ms. Bucko was admitted to the hospital’s emergency room on February 28, 2021, after first experiencing COVID-19 symptoms. Ms. Bucko’s condition deteriorated shortly after she was admitted, and she was transferred to the intensive care unit, where she was placed on a ventilator. Her condition deteriorated further when doctors informed her husband on April 1 that she had “little, if any, hope for recovery.”

According to the report, Mr. Mantel “researched possible alternative treatments, and he read several news stories about patients with severe COVID-19 illness who had been treated successfully with ivermectin.”

Mr. Mantel was able to persuade a hospital doctor to write an ivermectin prescription. The prescription, however, was initially held “on the grounds that Mount Sinai Health System recommends against the use of ivermectin for covid-19,” before being revoked the same day by the Hospital Stewardship Committee. According to the complaint, his wife was able to receive treatment only after Mr. Mantel obtained a court order compelling the hospital to fill the prescription. During that time, she improved.

“During and immediately following her ivermectin treatment, Ms. Bucko’s respiratory and cardiovascular functions significantly improved, and she required significantly less oxygen, vasopressors, and ventilator support, as clearly demonstrated in her medical records.”

“As a result of the ivermectin, Ms. Bucko was on her way to recovery.”

According to the filling, Ms. Bucko’s condition rapidly deteriorated after a second round of ivermectin was stopped on May 10, 2021. Mr. Mantel was preparing to return to court for the third time to obtain another emergency order for ivermectin when Ms. Bucko died on May 16, 2021.

The lawsuit seeks monetary compensation for her fourteen-year-old husband, as well as her two surviving children, as well as punitive damages, claiming that “once the ivermectin had been prescribed by Ms. Bucko’s doctor, it was a breach of accepted standards of medical care for the hospital to withhold this clearly beneficial medication from her.”

The lawsuit went on to say: “Defendant’s wrongful and negligent conduct deprived Ms. Bucko of a substantial chance for recovery and cure and substantially contributed to her untimely death.”

Mr. Mantel’s lawyer, Steven Warshawsky, told The Epoch Times that the hospital’s actions were against the patient’s best interests and violated the doctor-patient relationship.

“Early on during the pandemic there were a lot of early legal actions seeking court orders requiring hospitals and doctors to treat patients with ivermectin, but here you have a situation where orders were issued and the hospital did not fully comply with them despite [the] patient showing progress of ivermectin,” Mr. Warshawsky said.

Ivermectin has been around for decades, but it became the subject of debate in 2020 after medical experts disagreed on its efficacy as a treatment for COVID-19. Following that, many pharmacists refused to fill the medication’s prescriptions.

By 2023, the issue had reached the courtroom in a case brought by Dr. Mary Talley Bowden and other medical professionals when, on Aug. 8, a lawyer representing the FDA confirmed that doctors could prescribe ivermectin to treat COVID-19.
“FDA explicitly recognizes that doctors have the authority to prescribe ivermectin to treat COVID,” Ashley Cheung Honold, a Department of Justice lawyer representing the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), told the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

Despite FDA statements affirming that right to doctors, Dr. Bowden told The Epoch Times in an earlier interview that many pharmacists nationwide are still refusing to fill prescriptions for ivermectin issued to patients for the treatment of COVID-19.
“This must come to an end.” “We effectively have a large group of pharmacists practicing medicine without a license when I tell my patients what medicines they can and cannot have access to,” Dr. Bowden said on Friday. “They have no accountability for this yet they are allowed to dictate patient care.”

“I see it on a daily basis. “Enough already,” Dr. Bowden added.

Mr. Warshawsky, who claims the hospital will file a motion later this month, believes a victory for Mr. Mantel and his family will set a precedent that will protect patient rights in the future.

“I am hoping to not only get a good result for Deborah and her family but certainly to lay a precedent which is that physicians cannot withhold life-saving treatments from their patients, not only in the case of ivermectin, but also with other medications that might not be standard protocol for hospitals,” Mr. Warshawsky said.