This has just appeared in comp.risks - my favourite usenet group. I
don't know if it's tru, but it sounds frighteningly plausible
Ross
>>"For several months, our nurses have been baffled to find a dead patient 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 cleaner 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 enquiry is now closed."
>>
>>from (Cape Times, 6/13/96)
>>BTW, the headline of the newspaper story was, "Cleaner Polishes Off
>>Patients."
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