18/01/03

There's no-one with him!

USA In one of the most daring developments since the landmark Roe vs. Wade decision 30 years ago, hundreds of women across the nation spoke out around the Jan. 22 "Right to Life March" about crying in dark closets, becoming infertile, taking drugs, giving up hope -- all because of having an abortion.

And don't all you religious folk deluge poor AH with a thousand anti-abortion articles. This is not an issue that he feels able to comment upon - not for moral reasons and not because he does not deign to comment on what women should do with their bodies. 

The plain truth is that he just does not know what to think. 

And this is not for lack of effort!

However, for reasons that will not be apparent to the less able of his readers, the issue of abortion always reminds AH of an incident that occurred when he worked as a youth as a hospital porter in the 1960s.

Oh No Angry Harry. Not that again!

Yep.

'Fraid so.

Anyway.

There he was stuffing himself with bacon, eggs and fried tomatoes one sunny Saturday morning in the hospital canteen during his tea break when he was summoned to get ready for an emergency in the Casualty department.

The ambulance was on its way.

It was arriving just as AH approached. 

Two somewhat broken and bloodied bodies were pulled out and wheeled into the emergency rooms.

It turned out that they were an elderly couple - in their 60s - who had been out shopping and a car had veered off the road and ploughed straight into them. The wife was dead. The husband was unconscious but was probably going to survive.

When the casualty doctors had done their bit, AH was instructed to take the husband to get him X-rayed - which he did. He had to wait for ages because the radiologist was nowhere to be found. (If you live in the UK, it is very unwise to have an accident at the weekend!)

After about half an hour, the radiologist arrived, took the X-Rays, and AH wheeled the old man back to Casualty where the doctors would await for the images to be processed and would then proceed accordingly.

AH went off to do other things.

About two hours later, while passing the X-Ray department on another mission, he noticed that the same old man had been left lying on a trolley just outside the X-Ray room. And no-one seemed to be about. What is going on here? AH thought.

And he decided to find out.

Off he trundled to the Casualty Department where he discovered from two of the nurses that further X-Rays were needed before the old man was finally admitted into one of the wards.

"But there's no-one there. There's no-one with him," AH protested.

"She must have gone off somewhere," said one of the nurses, not particularly perturbed at the fact that the radiologist appeared to have abandoned the old man.

Well, AH was having none of that! So, off he went back to the X-Ray department and sat down beside the old man to await the radiologist.

Circulating through his mind over and over again was the thought of how awful it was going to be when this man finally gained consciousness only to discover that he was very badly damaged and that his wife was dead.

It was a very depressing thought!

And it was haunting him.

Eventually, the radiologist turned up, took the X-Rays, and then AH wheeled the old man up to the appropriate ward.

Anyway.

At about three o'clock in the afternoon, another ambulance tore through the gates. On the trolley, AH helped to wheel in a dead nine year old boy. Apparently, another boy had thrown a stone at him while they were playing in the park and he had, quite simply, been killed by this. The mark was very visible on his right temple. And it wasn't very big!

The same two casualty nurses that AH had spoken to earlier approached the trolley and helped him to wheel the boy into the resuscitation room just as the doctor came running in.

But there was no hope. The boy had clearly been dead for some time.

And the thing is this.

They both started to cry.

Hmm.

It's a strange world isn't it?

Since writing this piece a few emails have pointed out that it is well-known that having one's own child die is the worst death experience that most people can have.

Well, in fact, AH knows this.

But in the above case, the staff exhibited a considerable degree of callousness toward the old couple - particularly when compared to their attitude toward the boy.

And it was the degree of difference between their attitudes toward the old and the young that was - and is - disconcerting.