Flu patient dies when hospital denies treatment

This story underscores again the urgency of health care reform - even as greedy medical corporations try to wrest every concession they possibly can out of the White House.

In Utah, a woman who was only 47 died of swine flu when a hospital refused to administer Tamiflu. She suffered for 8 days, while the hospital denied she was ill. Her flu turned into pneumonia, and her kidneys and lungs failed.

This follows Utah's attempts to shut down its state health department entirely. Utah did reduce funding for the department to just a token sum. This likely contributed to the Beehive State having one of the highest rates of swine flu.

Swine flu continues to spiral out of control in Utah because - as is typical in states with incompetent government - so many school districts have switched to year-round school. No Utah district has called off school because of the flu - even though they shouldn't even still be in school when it's June 15.

It's unnerving how much this reminds me of the attitude displayed by local right-wing BBS idiots who bragged that it would be worth getting sick to have a longer school year. And I bet they still say it. They don't care about anyone except having them around to exploit.

Sadly, that attitude kills.

It gets worse.

As more evidence of seemingly deliberate incompetence in Utah state government, officials there now say they're going to stop counting swine flu cases - using the excuse that it has spread too quickly.

Seriously, they said that. In other words, a problem is getting worse, so they're going to ignore it.

There should be tribunals against state officials for this. These are crimes against humanity.

(Source: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/6/15/742704/-47-Year-Old-Dies-from-Swine-Flu,-Utah-Hospital-Refused-to-Give-Her-Tamiflu;
http://www.sltrib.com/ci_12590187;
http://www.sltrib.com/ci_12594446)