Unvaccinated Diner Owner Who Defied Lockdown Restrictions Dies Of COVID-19

A diner owner in Michigan has died of COVID-19, a little over a year after he opened his restaurant to customers during the last holiday season in defiance of state shutdowns.

John Parney Sr. died on Dec. 14 after battling COVID-19 for more than two months, local media outlet MLive.com reported.

The 62-year-old was brought on Sept. 29 to the emergency department of Hillsdale Hospital in Hillsdale, Michigan, where it was revealed he had contracted COVID-19. He was discharged and sent home after being hospitalized for three days.

However, Parney's condition deteriorated in the following days, and he was later found "incoherent and confused in his bed," according to a GoFundMe page organized by his family. He was brought back to the hospital and was isolated as well as given oxygen due to his "dangerously low" vitals.

Parney went through "many medical setbacks," which included undergoing surgery for a chest tube after one of his lungs "blew out" and having a tracheotomy.

The Marine Corps veteran was unvaccinated prior to his illness, but he told his family that he would get the jab after he is discharged from the hospital because "the battle, at that point, was worse than any training he endured in the military," according to the GoFundMe post.

It was unclear whether Parney was taken to the Select Specialty Hospital in Battle Creek before he died. His family said in the post that they planned to transfer him there if his condition stabilized.

Parney made headlines in December last year after he kept his restaurant, the Quincy Diner at 174 East Chicago Street in the village of Quincy, open to dine-in customers in violation of a shutdown imposed by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services.

"My wife’s fighting stage-four colon cancer. We depend on this restaurant to help subsidize billing and all of that. My employees need that. Of course, if I’d have stayed closed much longer, I’d have lost the business," Parney was quoted as saying at the time.

It was unclear if Parney and his restaurant were penalized for the decision.

The Quincy Diner had "suffered significant economic losses due to the pandemic," according to the GoFundMe post. It reportedly lost $250,000 from the first shutdown at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic but received government aid through the federal Paycheck Protection Program.

The assistance, however, only provided "a fraction of what they would have earned from their business had it been able to remain open," Parney's family said.

Prior to his death, Parney ran his diner as the restaurant’s general manager while also working full time as a manager at Firekeepers Casino.

Parney's GoFundMe page was initially raising money to help cover the travel expenses of his wife, Paula, to and from his hospital. Additionally, it was supposed to finance anticipated costs for Parney's rehabilitation and living expenses as he was no longer receiving any income from his job during his hospitalization.

The fundraiser, which will now reportedly help cover Paula's trips to Ann Arbor for cancer treatment, has received $22,700 in donations as of writing, nearly reaching its $25,000 goal.

An additional fundraiser is scheduled to take place at the Hillsdale Pizza Hut along 508 West Carleton Road between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Jan. 11, with 10% of the restaurant's sales going to Parney's family.

The U.S. has reported more than 51.5 million COVID-19 cases and 810,000 deaths as of Wednesday, according to data published by The New York Times.