I read these boards occassionally, but since I have nothing much to add about air travel, I never registered. But I had to respond to this ridiculous "article" with some facts. In full disclosure, I am a gastroenterologist so I am very familiar with cirrhotic patients.

The concept of the patient "dying in the gate" is just sensationalistic. If he is truly dying at the gate, he should be back in the hospital, NOT on a plane to go to UCSF. The article makes it sounds like the gentleman is going to get off the plane, get in a taxi to UCSF, and get a liver transplant that night. Which is ludicrous. It's at LEAST a few weeks to get listed, then it is weeks to years to get a transplant depending on how ill you are. And if this guy can get on a plane, he is by far not the sickest Hep C patient. Which makes reading things like "Again, a race against his death's clock" so irritating.
I say all of this because the website is talking about attorneys and suing the airline, etc. They did not put him at any risk. I think they should have given him a free extra seat, but they were not criminally negligent. There are a lot of other strange medical details that I will leave out...

I realize that this is 'off-topic' but I wanted to say that I don't think Southwest did anything terribly egregious. Just perhaps not particularly nice...