HIV-positive man who says he can't wear a face mask sues Boston Medical Center for refusing to treat him anymore

Update: Judge rejected request for temporary restraining order, saying in part there are other places where he could get the pills.

An HIV-positive man who says he refuses to wear face masks for semi-annual checkups because they make him anxious and sick is suing Boston Medical Center, two doctors there and the state Department of Public Health for $10.7 million because his doctors will no longer write him the prescriptions for the pills that keep his HIV in check.

In a lawsuit filed yesterday in Suffolk Superior Court, the man, identified as John Doe, is also asking a judge to issue a temporary restraining order requiring his BMC doctors to write out prescriptions for the anti-HIV drugs he says he will run out of on Thursday.

Doe says that when the Covid-19 pandemic hit here in March, 2020, his doctors at first switched him to telemedicine checkups, after which they would authorize another six months worth of the pills.

After the hospital began allowing patients to resume non-emergency visits, but on condition they put on face masks, he said he tried once to comply, in September, 2021, and immediately developed symptoms that included anxiety, itchy eyes and a burning feeling in his throat. Afterwards, he says, he developed a rash on his face, and in particular on his upper lip, that lasted for several weeks. He says he has experienced similar symptoms other times he's put on a mask due to Covid-19 requirements elsewhere.

When he returned for his next appointment, in February of this year, he says, he refused to put on a mask and was not allowed in to see his doctor - who, however, agreed to write him a prescription for another six months worth of pills.

Then he hired a lawyer to help negotiate a "reasonable modification" to the hospital mask requirement in his case. On Sept. 7, his complaint says, he went to the hospital for his semi-annual exam and blood test and with a copy of a letter from his attorney seeking such a modification and a phone in video record mode. He got to his doctor's waiting room, where the receptionist handed him a mask and asked him to put it on, he refused and she summoned security. Two guards arrived, asked him to put the mask and he again refused, after which they left, only to return with a hospital official who told him he could either put a mask on or leave and let the lawyers sort it out.

The complaint alleges that state Covid-19 regulations allow for exemptions from mask requirements for medical reasons, that he has proven he has such reasons and that the hospital and the two doctors who had been providing his care need to begin providing his care again.

He alleges that on his Sept. 7 visit, he saw four employees of the hospital's Infectious Diseases Center who were either maskless or who work their masks under their noses, and that afterwards, a BMC official told his lawyer he would have to find another place to get care if he did not comply with BMC's mask requirement.

He added that on Oct. 12, he ran out of his pills and went to the BMC emergency room to seek more pills but was denied. The complaint says he managed to find another source, but for only enough pills to last him through this Thursday.

The formal counts in his complaint include invasion of privacy, medical battery, medical assault and violation of the state Patients Bill of Rights and the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.

In addition to the monetary demands, he is seeking an order making the hospital resume his prescriptions and that he be allowed to get care at BMC without having to wear a mask.