Posted on 08/25/2007 3:41:44 PM PDT by metmom
Dr. Anna Pou was accused of murdering nine patients in a New Orleans hospital wracked by Katrina, but a grand jury declined to indict her. Now she gives her side of the story.
Aug. 25, 2007 - The tragic deaths at New Orleans’s Memorial Medical Center after Hurricane Katrina are among the most notorious examples of the vast human suffering that resulted from the destruction of the levees and the flooding of the city—and the government’s incompetent response to the disaster. At least 34 people died in the hospital awaiting evacuation and it wasn’t long before dark rumors began circulating that some of them were helped along by lethal doses of morphine or other medication. Almost a year after the storm, in July 2006, authorities arrested Dr. Anna Pou, a well-known head and neck surgeon. She was eventually accused of murdering nine patients who were in a long-term acute care unit on the seventh floor run by LifeCare Hospital of New Orleans.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
And Bush’s fault, I’m sure.
The stuff I saw on TV was enough for me to be grateful I was not there to deal with any of it.
To be in the position the medical staff had to face... the system failed them.
In any catastrophic situation there comes a point where civilized people are forced to make unthinkable decisions.
the battle cry of the victim.
In any catastrophic situation there comes a point where civilized people are forced to make unthinkable decisions.
too much tv.
very smooth....exlax
Sounds to me like the docs did the best they could. What a terrible situation for all concerned.
On the other hand, one of the lessons- learned from hurricane Andrew as reported by the CIO of Ryder was that you should let the families of the duty staf shelter at the facility. Otherwise, the staff spends all their time frantic about their loved ones out in the aftermath and cannot adequately perform their job. The key is that you make sure ahead of time to provide for them, not bring everydony in and dial 1-800-SEND-FEMA.
[To be in the position the medical staff had to face... the system failed them.]
There is no ‘system’ to put in place in a situation like NOLA in Katrina. There is no amount of planning that can be applied to all areas apt to be hit. We don’t have the resources to enact such a ‘system’ which can combat the infinity of possible situations.
Technology is such a blessing, but when the electricity goes off, there’s only so much one can do.
The whole Katrina situation was such a fiasco. People were warned to leave and didn’t, patients weren’t transfered beforehand, when they knew it was coming.
It wasn’t just the hospitals, it was nursing homes as well. It would have been far easier to move patients ahead of time. There wasn’t much doubt about it hitting and the worst case scenario could have been expected. Even it they waited and started moving patients later than they would have liked, some would have been saved.
I find it so hard to believe that more rescue helicopters couldn’t have been found and used. We have a whole country of resources to draw on.
Mr. Foti (attorney general) should be horse whipped for this.
mayor Nagin should have intervened
My son spent a week in this hospital two months before Katrina. My wife stayed with him. He was within 3 weeks of having major surgery here when Katrina hit.
The conditions at this hospital after Katrina were, if anything, understated in this interview. I agree it is unconscionable that in the USA patients and staff in a hospital like this could be left so long in these conditions. Hospitals were not high enough on the priority list of those in authority to allocate resources. This is not second guessing, it is a factual statement. I never before have witnessed government incompetence on such a scale.
IMHO, if anyone should have been indicted,it should not have been this poor doctor. I would trust her to be my physician any time.
You got that exactly right.No matter how bad a situation is,there’s always one more thing you can do to try to help.
Yeah. I disagreed with the doc on that. If families had not been there, she would have had even less help. I never understood why this happened. Why could they have not evacuated from the roof? Surely there was one helicopter that could have been assigned to this hospital.
Even then, he let hundreds of buses and other conveyances, that could have been used to evacuate people, sit empty and idle. There was no emergency stores of food or even water at places designated as shelters. (But I suspicion if anyone did a real investigation, there was plenty of money on the books "spent for emergency supplies")
President Bush declared an emergency two days BEFORE the hurricane = unprecedented = but they couldn’t move into the state without the permission of the Governor - Blanco - or then the city, without Nagel’s ok. They refused for days.
That’s why we saw the Coast Guard as the first line of aid for days = because New Orleans was on the coast, the Coast Guard did not require local or state authority.
And yet, Pres. Bush, will go down in history as the culprit, with the mantra of the lying liberal scum.
(I’m sure they were deeply disappointed that Dean never touched the country. I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts that the presses were all ready to run with Bush-Bash headlines.)
????
Intervened?
He should have been indited! He should be in jail.
See my post # 15
Why was Nagel not indited?
bulloney. If Katrina had hit a blue state none of this would have happened. What happened was all the fault of the RAT politicians in Louisiana and NO. The people have nobody to blame but themselves for electing them.
What about your governor? Shouldn’t she also be held accountable? We had a close call last week. At one time we were the bulls eye for Dean. We were ready to go at the first turn. The governor requested assistance days before. We had our patients and nursing home residents ready to roll. I’m not saying we have all the answers and everything would have worked perfectly but we took the warnings seriously and prepared for the worst.
And the one guy who used his brains and commandeered a bus and likely saved people’s lives, was going to have charges brought against him for taking the bus without authorization.
There should have been more people with such incentive.
All those people who refused to leave and had to be rescued from the rooftops, were just as guilty because by their selfish inaction, they tied up resources that could ahve been used elsewhere.
IIRC, there was also reports of the helicopters doing rescue work that were being shot at.
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