Boy Is Denied Place on List for New Liver

Money, legal residency and forms-in-triplicate have little value to a 5-year-old boy--even less to a sick one.

But money, legal residency and forms-in-triplicate are exactly the things that will decide the future of Armando Vargas, lying gravely ill in a bed at UCLA Medical Center, a victim of chronic liver disease.

Normally Armando would be placed on a donor list for a new liver almost immediately and California Children’s Services would arrange for the $150,000 operation to be paid for by the state. But Armando is not a permanent Los Angeles County resident.

Thursday, an advocacy group completed a complicated application and found a guardian for the boy in an attempt to qualify him for state aid. State and hospital officials expect to decide today whether the boy qualifies for a transplant--ahead of 29 other children on their list.

Armando and his parents, Graciela and Armando Sr., left the hotel they own in Tepic, Mexico, six weeks ago to try one last time to get the operation that is not available in Mexico and they could not afford in Texas, where they first inquired. They are now in this country on a temporary medical visa.

State welfare agencies will only use taxpayer money to fund the procedure if the recipient is a Los Angeles County resident, even if that resident is in the country illegally. Since the Vargases are not illegal and are not permanent residents, California Children’s Services, a branch of the state Department of Health, could not help them.

And since the Vargases could not afford the procedure, UCLA doctors would not place Armando on the donor list for a new liver until they know the hospital will get paid for the operation.

Meanwhile, Armando, who doctors say can only survive several months without a transplant, began to hemorrhage and was placed in intensive care. He was in stable condition Thursday.

Finally, Graciela Vargas turned to the Right to Life Committee, the organization that paved the way for the heart operation that saved the life of Baby Jesse, the infant who could only have heart transplant surgery at Loma Linda Medical Center if the teen-age mother’s grandmother was established as guardian. They are seeking to “cut through the red tape” and get Armando on the donor list, despite his foreign status.

In order to qualify for state funds, Right to Life attorneys have arranged for a county resident, who wished to remain anonymous, to be Armando’s legal guardian. After preliminary interviews with Children’s Services and document reviews, final paperwork was submitted late Thursday. Children’s Services officials would not comment directly on the case until they had reviewed the latest documents.

“He may not be a citizen of the United States, but he’s a citizen of the world,” said Susan Carpenter-McMillan, spokeswoman for the Right to Life Committee at a press conference Thursday. “And if we can send UCLA doctors to Russia . . . we can save one little boy’s life.”

But there are those who wonder whether a foreign national should be able to receive an operation paid for by U.S. taxpayers, especially when those nationals could conceivably receive organs before American recipients on the list.

“It’s really unfair,” said a UCLA doctor familiar with the Vargas case who wished to remain anonymous. “We’ve got kids of our own who need this operation. Can we really expect the citizens of California to pay for an operation for somebody who’s not even legal?”

“States are going to have to decide who they are going to take care of,” the doctor continued. “I as a taxpayer would not want to pay for this.”

Since Armando is in the critical end stages of the disease, hospital officials said that once placed on the list he could receive a liver before any of the 29 other children on the list ahead of him.