March 29, 2024

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, negligence lawsuit arises

Tenet Healthcare Corporation is now part of a class-action suit—with a jury set to decide whether or not this corporation should be held accountable for the injuries and deaths at Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans.  The hospital was in desperate need for help after it was inundated with flood-water by Hurricane Katrina.  Memorial Medical Center, housed 1800 people during the storm, begged Tenet Healthcare Corporation for supplies and an airlift.  Email exchanges between Memorial Medical Center and Tenet Healthcare Corporation will be used in this lawsuit to show the desperate situation.  One email exposes the plea for help and the lack of reaction by the parent corporation.

The negligence suit, brought on behalf of the people that were at the hospital during the Hurricane, claims that insufficiencies in Memorial’s backup electrical system, along with failing to properly plan for patient care and evacuation resulted in personal injury and death.  After Hurricane Katrina, 45 bodies were discovered at Memorial, many more than other hospitals. In fact, doctors admitted that they had given patients drugs to hasten their deaths.  No criminal charges were brought against the doctors.  One civil claim of euthanasia was brought against a memorial doctor.  It was dismissed and is now being appealed.

Tenet and Memorial plan to argue the city’s failed levees, the huge hurricane and poor government response created the deadly environment.  However, Memorial may have had notice to make changes long before Hurricane Katrina; Memorial did not take a recommendation given in 2004 to move components of its electrical system above the bottom floor.  Memorial’s air conditioning shut down, first, by design, as the hospital emergency power system is not required to support air conditioning or heating.  Once the air conditioning shut off, the temperature in Memorial rose to over 100 degrees.  The increase in temperature created unlivable conditions and this caused numerous deaths, especially in elderly patients.

 

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