Tonya Ingram

Tonya Ingram (September 1, 1991 – December 30, 2022) was an American poet, author, speaker, disability activist, and mental health advocate.

Ingram died on December 30, 2022, waiting for a kidney transplant.

Ingram was a graduate of New York University and Otis College of Art and Design.

While at NYU, Ingram performed on the school's poetry slam team, which won the 2013 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational.

Ingram founded the team alongside Eric Silver, Matthew Sparacino, and Safia Elhillo.

They were coached by Mahogany Browne.

Ingram's writing was often about Black feminism and living with Lupus and kidney failure.

Ingram performed at the Nuyorican Poets Café, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and Lexus Verses and Flow's variety show.

Her work was featured in the 2021 Madewell "What Are You Made Of? Creatives of Color" campaign, Hallmark's Mahogany Writing Community and card brand, MIGA Swimwear, The New York Times, To Write Love on Her Arms, and Hello Giggles.

Ingram was the curator of Poetry in Color Live! at Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

In addition to poetry, Ingram wrote and contributed to high-profile journalistic pieces on wasted organ donations, the dysfunction of the American healthcare system, the impact of COVID-19 on disabled people, and other disability rights issues.

In 2021, she testified as a patient on the kidney transplant waitlist on a House of Representatives hearing regarding the organ transplant system.

In 2019, at age 27, Ingram posted on Instagram looking for a living person willing to become her kidney-donor.

Utilizing journalism, Ingram and writer and organ-recipient, Kendall Ciesemier, asked the government to hold the organizations involved in OPS accountable, believing this would result in Ingram receiving a kidney.

Ingram wrote an opinion essay; appeared in a government video; wrote letters to members of the Biden administration, including the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (C.M.S.) administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure and the head of the Health Resources and Services Administration, Carole Johnson; worked with members of Congress, including Representative Katie Porter; and even testified before the House Oversight Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy in May 2021.

Ingram told the House Oversight Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy that she would die without the federal government's urgent action.

A year and a half later, on December 30, 2022, Ingram died of complications from kidney failure.

In 2022, Ingram was one of 12,000 people on waiting lists who died or became too sick to receive a transplant.

Ingram's friend and fellow journalist, Kendall Ciesemier, commented on future potential for intervention in the organ procurement system by the American government:

Ingram was found unresponsive during a wellness check at her apartment around noon on December 30, 2022.

Her death was announced in an Instagram post on New Year's Day.

Hernandez and his wife Alyesha Wise were close friends of Ingram's and raised $30,000 for funeral arrangements and to build a trust to send Ingram's 15-year-old younger sister to college.

With the money, they honored Ingram's wish to have a green burial underneath a tree.

The ceremony to bury her occurred on the grounds of Hollywood Forever Cemetery under a California Oak on January 27, 2023.

An article from the Los Angeles Times states, "Ingram was on the kidney donor wait list for three years. In an interview, [Matthew "Cuban"] Hernandez said he believed her death was preventable."

The Biden administration subsequently announced intentions to reform the organ transplant system.

In 2020, Ingram learned to surf through Color the Water and AdventureCrew, BIPOC surfing communities, and attended a surf retreat in Nicaragua.