Hospital Dumped Patients on Skid Row, Police Say/ This IS sick!!!

[inthebrain]

Hospital Dumped Patients on Skid Row, Police Say

Authorities are launching a criminal investigation after police officers in Los Angeles say they videotaped five hospital patients being dumped on Skid Row over the weekend. The incident is being cited as the latest in an ongoing problem of indigent hospital patients being dumped on the streets with no one to care for them.

The 50 square blocks of Skid Row are home to more than 10,000 people with no where else to go. It has many shelters, social service agencies -- as well as convicted sex offenders and just about any illegal drug you can think of.

In other words, it's no place for someone who's still sick enough to be transported in an ambulance. But last Sunday, Los Angeles police captured video and still photos of five patients from a single hospital being dropped off in front of the Volunteers of America Service Center.

We told the ambulance driver that the person wasn't appropriate for us," says Jim Howatt, director of the center's homeless services, "and they wouldn't be able to leave them. And it's about that point that the police became involved."

When the police interviewed the first couple of ambulance drivers they found out that the drop-off wasn't a fluke. It was more like a plan, says police Capt. Andrew Smith.

"Sergeants interviewed the ambulance attendants and found out that there were three more ambulances waiting on the corner of 22nd and Western," Smith says, waiting to drop off more people in the area.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6376588

[DRoseDARs]

1. Ah, this is the same story from a few weeks back (Oct24th); any new news on it? n/t

[Sydnie]

2. ER (the show) used this story in their show tonight

At least it might enter the "main stream" that way? :shrug:

[Warpy]

3. Throw away people

Since the wealthy don't need all of us any more, they feel free to dump the discards in any hellhole out there to die as quickly as possible.

The hospital's reasoning is that they're medically stable (HA!) and can go back to their shelters and drop them off in the area of the city where the most services are available.

The services, unfortunately, are stretched to the breaking point trying to cope with healthy people.

This is just one more vile example of just how vile this country has become for anyone who doesn't fit the GOP stereotype of the "proper" sort of person.

[MADem]

4. The new Poorhouses, I guess... NT

[Stargazer99]

5. A perfect illustration of Republican values!

[tabasco]

6. So it's come to this.

Such sad days for America.

[silverojo]

7. This is the type of issue Dems should discuss more

People are dying here from this sort of neglect, but just because it isn't as newsworthy as a war, nobody cares.

It's time this country starts to care! :mad: