Cleaner Polishes Off Patient
(Not
herself a Darwin Award candidate, but of note in our list of stupid and morbid
events)
"For several months, our nurses have been baffled to find a patient dead in
the same bed every Friday morning" a spokeswoman for the Pelonomi Hospital
(Free State, South Africa) told reporters. "There was no apparent cause for
any of the deaths, and extensive checks on the air conditioning system, and a
search for possible bacterial infection, failed to reveal any clues."
"However, further inquiries have now revealed the cause of these deaths...
It seems that every Friday morning a cleaning lady would enter the ward, remove
the plug that powered the patient's life support system, plug her floor polisher
into the vacant socket, then go about her business." "When she had
finished her chores, she would plug the life support machine back in and leave,
unaware that the patient was now dead. She could not, after all, hear the
screams and eventual death rattle over the whirring of her polisher..."
"We are sorry, and have sent a strong letter to the cleaner in question.
Further, the Free State Health and Welfare Department is arranging for an
electrician to fit an extra socket so there should be no repetition of this
incident. The inquiry is now closed." (Interview taken from the Cape Times
newspaper).