3 people dead, 40 wounded, at Central Louisiana State Hospital in Pineville, Louisiana. The suspected culprit in the matter at this point is food poisoning. The associated press reported on the incident with a story, Food poisoning suspected in 3 La. hospital deaths.
Lisa Faust, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Health and Hospitals, says the patients had chicken salad Thursday night.
She says something bad could have been in the chicken, lettuce or mayonnaise.
USA Today filled in a few more details with a report of their own, 3 Die at Pineville hospital, 40 ill.
Forty patients at the behavioral health hospital showed signs of gastrointestinal stress beginning around 6:30 a.m. Friday with the three deaths a 43-year-old woman, 41-year-old man and 52-year-old man happening late Friday night or early Saturday morning.
State Department of Health and Hospitals Secretary Alan Levine told reporters Saturday that autopsies of the three patients are scheduled Monday, with lab test results expected in a few days.
Two patients remain hospitalized at Huey P. Long Medical Center in Pineville. A total of 11 patients and four staff members were treated there for possible food-poisoning symptoms.
I know that sometimes hospital food can be foul, but usually it’s not going to kill you. Hopefully this incident is not going to result in, always a possibility, a less delectable menu for its inmates and guards.
Close the hospital down, liberate its inmates, and you won’t have this kind of thing happening there in the future. Most parents, not all mind you, don’t want their children coming home from the looney bin in a casket.
Filed under: Biological Psychiatry, Environment, Health Care, Human Rights, Investigation, Law, Mental Health Care, State Hospital |
Hopefully this incident will result in several lawsuits, if not real justice for these poor people. And sadly, a great many people in mental institutions don’t have parents or any other viable support network on the outside 😦
Very possibly so. A law firm is already speaking about it.
That people got sick, probably viral gastroenteritis, isn’t necessarily a sign of abuse or neglect. But that three inmates died almost certainly is. I suspect that these three were “long” term inmates, possibly in the forensic facility. It’s likely that they were ignored and dying from dehydration before medical attention, if any, was given. The public will never get the true story.
Hi marlboro.
I’m not so sure myself. Some of the illness victims were staff members who must have been eating the same food. As you say, “The public will never get the true story.” The public will never get the whole story.
[…] Hospital) Remember Central Louisiana State, I posted a blog entry about the place awhile ago, 3 dead in Pineville Louisiana. Following investigations into this incident, the administrator and the associate administrator of […]