|
|
Nearly 20 Elderly Care Facilities under Investigation
Team 4 News
October 3, 2005
Leigh Ajan, a displaced victim of Hurricane Katrina from the New Orleans area,
begins crying as she prays near the beginning of Mass Monday
Photo by Jim Beckel, AP Photo
New Orleans State Attorney General Charles Foti says that six hospitals and 13 nursing homes in Louisiana are under investigation in the deaths of dozens of elderly patients following Hurricane Katrina.
At issue is whether the facilities mishandled evacuations of patients, abandoned them during the devastating storm or euthanized patients to spare them pain when rescuers didn't arrive for days.
Foti told a legislative committee hearing that the investigation includes Charity Hospital, New Orleans' major public hospital.
At least 140 elderly patients in nursing homes and hospitals died in the storm and its aftermath; dozens more who were living independently may have perished.
Prosecutors have kept the investigations under wraps, but Dallas-based Tenet Healthcare Corporation issued a statement Sunday saying attorney general's agents seized records and other material from its Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans.
|
|
