Cleaner Polishes Off Patients

The Cape Times (South Africa):

"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." (Cape Times)

The headline of the newspaper story was,

"Cleaner Polishes Off Patients"