In 1994, a young woman was rushed to an ER and as she was being treated bizarre things started to happen to the nurses and doctors. Jimmy Akin and Dom Bettinelli look at what happened to Gloria Ramirez and the hospital staff and what could explain the strange events surrounding her death.AI-powered
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The Medical Mystery of “the Toxic Woman” (Gloria Ramirez, Toxic Lady)
Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World
What Happened to the Emergency Room?
Two hours after gloria died, at 11 p.m., the river side county hasmat team arrived in full protective gear. They searched for any of a host of noxious chemicals - including hydrogen sulphide and phosgin. To the relief of hospitalist s, the casma crew detected none of these chemicals in the emergency room. But the failure to find any toxic substance in the e r only deepened the mystery. The situation was particularly unnerving for the court county coroner's office, because theyre required to investigate any suspicious deaths that meant that they needed to perform an autopsy without their staff knowing anything about what caused the dangerous situation. An investigation by California occupational safety and health
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Speaker 3
Hospital staff were treating patients and ill colleagues under the dull orange glow of sulphur lamps. Because of concern that the stricken staff had been felled by a noxious chemical, they were stripped down to their underwear and their clothes were bund led into plastic bags. Doctor gocinski continued to experience tremors and apnia. Nurse kane flailed her arms and kicked, and her face still burned. Meanwhile, sally baldaris, a vocational nurse, who had gone back inside to help take ramir's body into the isolation room, began wretching and felt a burning sensation on her skin. Soon she was in such bad shape that she too was laid out on a gurney. All told, 23
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of the 37 emergency room staffers reported experiencing symptoms. So basically two thirds of them became ill as a result of whatever happened here. And five of them were sick ogh that they were hospitalized for the rest of the night at different hospitals. Since this one didn't seem to be quite safe. One of them would spend two weeks in intensive care. What
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was the county's reaction? To what was happening at the hospital. Two
Speaker 1
hours after gloria died, at 11 p m, the river side county hasmat team arrived in full protective gear. The hasmat team was after a smoking gun, some
Speaker 3
volatile toxicant that might yet be lurking in the air of the emergency room. They searched for any of a host of noxious chemicals, including hydrogen sulphide, also known as sewer gas, an insidious poison that smells like rotten eggs, and, at high concentrations, can kill a person after one or two whiffs, and phosgin, a gas with a dual identity. On the one hand, a law abiding ingredient used in the preparation of many organic chemicals, and on the other, a terrible weapon for chemical warfare that tears open capillaries in the lungs. To the relief of hospitalist s, the casma crew detected none of these chemicals in the emergency room. But the failure to find any toxic substance in the e r only deepened the mystery. The
Speaker 1
situation was particularly unnerving for the court county coroner's office, because theyre required to investigate any suspicious deaths that meant that they needed to perform an autopsy without their staff knowing anything about what caused the dangerous situation. They therefore contacted the california occupational safety and health administration, known as cal osha. The autopsy was planned for six days later, and to avoid a media frenzy, they did it at one in the morning, according
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to new time.
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