Snakehandler Gets Bit Dies - Sues Hospital
Filed Under (News, Stupidity) by Ian on 11-11-2007
Tagged Under : bite, hopsital, lawsuit, snake handling, snakes
Snake handling should be outlawed. Religious reasons be damned, teaching kids this sort of crap is straight up wrong.
Snakebite victim’s family sues - Blames Hospital, Nurse and Doctor
As a woman bitten by a rattlesnake during a church service in London struggled to breathe, hospital employees made derogatory comments about her religious beliefs rather than providing proper care, contributing to her death, a lawsuit charges.The case arises from the Nov. 5, 2006, death of Linda F. Long, 48, a London homemaker. Police said at the time that Long was handling a yellow timber rattler during a service at East London Holiness Church when the snake bit her on the right cheek.
People bitten by poisonous snakes during religious services sometimes refuse medical treatment. But others at that service quickly took Long to Marymount Medical Center in London.
According to the lawsuit, on the way to Marymount, someone in the vehicle called 911 at 7:46 p.m.; a dispatcher connected the call to the hospital, and the driver asked for an air ambulance to fly Long to Lexington. Hospital employees assured the Long family a helicopter was available.
A nurse met Long and those with her in the parking area outside the emergency room. Rather than take Long in right away, the nurse engaged Long and her family “in a lengthy and time-consuming series of questions” that went far beyond getting information needed to treat the snakebite, the lawsuit states.
After being taken into the hospital at 8:09 p.m., Long said she was having trouble breathing, and asked for oxygen. Hospital employees gave her a portable, oscillating fan as they allegedly “snickered and made derogatory comments” to employees — and Long’s family — about the religious beliefs and circumstances under which she was bitten.
The woman had her beliefs yes.
But the family of the woman knew the risks of handling these rattlers.
I handle snakes but non venomous.
For religious reasons?
If the hospital staff knowingly postponed necessary treatment for any reason, I think they are at fault. If all they did was laugh about it while doing their jobs, but the patient died anyway, they are not to blame for the death (but might, i guess, be disciplined for harassment or something). And of course, none of it would have happened if the patient hadn’t handled a damn snake.
I think the family should just accept that God decided it was time for her to move on. :) After all, he works in mysterious ways…right?
What’s really tragic is that most Christian denominations consider the final verses of Mark (16:9-20) a later addition, since it’s not found in the oldest manuscripts (which end with Mk 16:8, with the “empty tomb.” Many others who accept its veracity still tread lightly around it. (In my own fundie days we considered this passage to be a list of signs for only SOME Christians, not all.) So even an ardent fundamentalist need not hang his or her life on it.
As for the patient and family being intercepted in the hospital parking lot … I don’t know if that’s accepted practice in the UK, but here in the States this would NOT be acceptable. I have little sympathy for overzealous religionists who engage in reckless activity in the name of their distorted metaphysics, but if Long was maltreated by the hospital, I hope that won’t get lost in the shuffle.
They’re suing the hospital for these reasons, it doesn’t mean that the hospital actually mistreated anyone, it just means these religious wackjobs are saying they were.
Having worked on an ambulance service and in an ER, I can say that we had to treat people who did stupid things to themselves all the time, many times involving alcohol. Someone coming in because they did something stupid for religious reasons would be treated no differently.