Officials Investigate Possible Euthanasia Cases During Hurricane Katrina
BY Liz Townsend

On orders of Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti, 73 people have been subpoenaed as part of an investigation of whether euthanasia was used in a New Orleans hospital during Hurricane Katrina. According to CNN, the subpoenas went to employees of Memorial Medical Center, which is owned by Tenet Healthcare.

A spokeswoman for the attorney general's office told Reuters that the deaths of over 200 patients at Louisiana nursing homes and hospitals during and just after Hurricane Katrina are being examined.

The subpoenas were "for all levels of personnel," spokeswoman Kris Wartelle told the Associated Press, and included doctors, nurses, and support staff. They included people who were at the hospital during the storm and its aftermath "or they knew something about it," she said.

"In some places, they drowned," said Wartelle. "In some places, they died because there was no air conditioning. In other cases, we've heard of possible euthanasia."

Foti's actions followed allegations by a doctor and nurse manager that three days after Katrina flooded most of New Orleans August 29, staff members at Memorial had repeated discussions about euthanizing patients.

The hospital was cut off by flood waters for several days. Officials found 45 bodies in the hospital after the surviving patients and workers were evacuated, according to the Washington Times.

"Some people were not coming forward. We learned Tenet sent out a letter that had a chilling effect," Attorney General Charles Foti, Jr., told CNN. "We had no choice but to issue these subpoenas. They [Tenet] seem to be in a position of protecting themselves, while we are just trying to get to the facts of what happened at the hospital."

At least 180 patients and more than 1,000 other people sought shelter at Memorial Hospital on August 29, when Katrina struck, and the days afterward, CNN reported. But as the days wore on, conditions deteriorated.

Dr. Bryant King and nurse manager Fran Butler told CNN that they heard discussions by other doctors about "putting people out of their misery," although neither actually witnessed patients being euthanized.

King said he was so disturbed by what he saw and heard that he left the hospital on a boat. Although he now wonders if he could have done anything to save people if he had stayed, "I'd rather be considered a person who abandoned patients than someone who aided in eliminating patients," King told CNN.

The Orleans Parish coroner's office is performing autopsies on the bodies from Memorial to try to determine if patients were killed by lethal doses of medication. "There have been reports that doctors have been going around injecting people," coroner Frank Minyard told Knight Ridder Tribune News.
The euthanasia investigation is part of a larger probe by the attorney general's office into the deaths of at least 91 patients in six hospitals and 63 patients in 13 nursing homes during Hurricane Katrina, the Daily News reported.

"Allegations include patients being abandoned, evacuated improperly or euthanized, to spare them from further suffering while waiting for rescuers to arrive," according to the Associated Press.