Richard Roth, the last remaining original CNN employee and the company’s senior UN correspondent, is recovering following a successful kidney transplant surgery earlier this week. He received the kidney from donor Samira Jafari, the deputy managing editor of CNN’s investigations unit, whom he called his “heroine.”
“How do you thank someone who gets you off dialysis and saves your life?” Roth asked in a Friday note to colleagues. He added, “[This story] should be about [Samira], and how urgent the need is for live donors to ease the suffering of the over 100,000 desperately seeking an organ to survive.”