An example of our judicial/legal system AT IT’S BEST?
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1523720324855914498.html
More from @jesusrodriguezb
Jan 31
Today is my last day as senior articles editor of @GeorgetownLJ, so I thought I would share some pointers for authors in #lawtwitter submitting to the spring cycle, which opens tomorrow for us! After poring over thousands of submissions last year, here’s what has stood out to me:
1. Effective titles often caught my attention, especially when it was 1 a.m. and I was up assigning articles. Intros should tell us upfront what’s original about your piece — like in journalism, don’t bury the lede
2. Authors sometimes treat conclusions like 2–4-paragraph bows on top of the piece, but this is where the discussion and the implications of your argument need to be clearest.
Filed under: General Problems
Let’s not forget, this is the second individual who was criminalized for seeking medical care in recent times. The first was the woman who died from a stroke in police custody after staff at the hospital called on police ro eject her from the grounds for trespassing once they ‘determined’ she was not in need of medical care. Perhaps some don’t want to hear this, but the medical system also bears culpability in these cases. How is it that a person in medical distress can arrive at the hospital, be treated like human garbage and be kicked out of the one specific place that they can go for the issues they’re having (remember, self diagnosis is frowned on, so we look to those who are supposed to hold our health interests at the forefront for the answers), yet there’s little alarm in the public domain that something might be wrong there? The police are only doing what the hospital suggests is appropriate. They’re often poorly (or not at all) trained to recognize and respond to medical or mental health problems, aside from overdose. It’s almost certain when they arrive, that they assume the hospital has thoroughly examined the patient being trespassed and have decided that no care is necessary, which in a perfect world would be the ONLY reason someone is ever TRESPASSED from a hospital as the patient themselves, aside from threatening or aggressive behavior toward staff. Which is honestly pretty subjective these days, as it is. Perhaps if accountability were involved when it comes to forcing patients in medical distress out of the place we go for emergency care, it wouldn’t happen anymore. At least not with any regularity, as there will always be exceptions to any rule. Once this patient was in the judicial system though, the judge should have recognized that something was amiss and requested a medical evalutation, but instead chose to ask this man to blink his freaking eyes, which is low key acknowledgement that something was not right with him. If you ask me, everyone who was involved in the permanent alteration of this man’s life should be held accountable. He did only what we are told to do in the event of a potential medical emergency. I say “potential”, because again, we are told not to self diagnose or gauge how severe a health problem may or may not be. We are told by hospital staff that is THEIR job. So why the hell aren’t they doing it? This malarkey about being accused of drug seeking when no drugs were requested needs to be hard stopped. People are being subjected to inexcusable consequences because of that stigma. So if a person comes in and asks for help, if they truly believe they’re drug seeking, then decline to give opioids and THOROUGHLY EXAMINE THE PATIENT ANYWAY. It’s not hard to conceive of the proper course of action. And stop treating former pain patients like we aren’t WORTHY of care because we were once on adequate pain management. I feel for this guy, as well as the family of the woman who passed, both treated as if they don’t matter by a biased medical system, criminalized by the authorities who erroneously assumed they were rightfully labeled trespassers, and both suffering irreversible consequences from it all. This should never happen in this country and yet, here we are.
Agree 100 percent with you.
And yet no one wants to learn what will stop this propaganda against opioids. Too bad, so sad. And so it will continue.
Too bad, so sad? Your comment seems to be lacking any explanation.