UCSF Loses World-Renowned Canadian Heart Surgeon Over Trump Tensions

SAN FRANCISCO — Political tensions between Canada and President Donald Trump have cost UCSF Medical Center a world-renowned heart surgeon, who had planned to relocate from Ottawa this month but changed his mind amid tariff threats and talk of a northern 51st state, according to KQED.

Dr. Marc Ruel of the University of Ottawa Heart Institute in the fall accepted a job heading UCSF’s Division of Adult Cardiothoracic Surgery, but, on March 4, UCSF staff received a message that he would no longer be coming to California, “given the evolving political climate,” KQED reported.

“… I cannot in my patriotic conscience ignore what is happening,” Ruel told a prospective patient in California via email, according to KQED.

Read more from KQED.