Yep, that US healthcare system…truly the best in the world. Just ask Cuban immigrants:
Birgilio Marin-Fuentes had driven to Portland Adventist Medical Center shortly after midnight Thursday, unable to sleep or stop coughing, then crashed his car into a pillar and wall inside the first level of the hospital parking garage under an “emergency parking only” sign about 125 feet from the emergency room entrance.
By the time somebody noticed the 61-year-old Cuban immigrant in his car and told a police officer in the emergency room, about 20 minutes had gone by.
Officers Angela Luty and Robert Quick found Marin-Fuentes unconscious and unresponsive and began cardiopulmonary resuscitation. A third officer, Andrew Hearst, went to the ER intake desk and told them what was happening.
He was told to call emergency services.
“The officers recognized this man needed medical attention immediately, and two officers began CPR immediately, and a third officer went to ask for assistance, and they were told they had to wait until an ambulance arrived,” said Sgt. Pete Simpson, a Portland Police Bureau spokesman.
The problem is that this incident was treated as a car crash, when in fact it was a heart attack that led to it. In any case, telling someone to wait for an ambulance when the incident took place just steps away from a hospital emergency room is beyond ridiculous. Don’t they have gurneys there already? Or people who know how to deal with a car-crash victim?
Somehow, I don’t think this corresponds to the notion of a better life that this immigrant came from Cuba for.
