Outrage of the Moment

THE LITTLE GUY (OR GAL) GETS CLOBBERED (OR HAMMERED) AGAIN

first posted 6/18/00

"I was totally shocked.  I had just received a letter of commendation from the president of the hospital two weeks before."    Marilou Sadd

Those are the words of a 41-year-old nurse  reflecting on her dismissal from employment with a Long Island hospital the week after Christmas 1999,  just two days after she told her bosses she had breast cancer.  

At the same time the New York area press was hailing the humanizing of mayor Rudolph Giulianni following the discovery of his prostate cancer,  Marilou Sadd, a single mother with three children, was announcing that she was filing suit for $10 million against the Brookhaven Memorial Medical Center in Patchogue, all attempts to reverse her wrongful termination having failed.  Sadd contends that she was unlawfully discharged by the hospital in anticipation of  "future expensive absences"  but the hospital claims that the firing resulted from absences unrelated to the cancer.  From the perspective of the hospital administration, it must have been just a wildly ill-timed coincidence that, just as they were getting ready to can a malingerer, she up and told them she had cancer;  those little guys (and gals) get all the breaks.  

In February, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled that Brookhaven violated federal law by firing Sadd.  The nurse urged her bosses to contact a former employer who would confirm that, during an earlier battle against breast cancer six years ago, she missed only three days of work; the hospital refused to subject itself to this information.  Instead, Sadd laments, "They took away my livelihood ... and my health insurance,"  leaving her in danger of losing her home.  

Ginny Markat, spokeswoman for Brookhaven Memorial Medical Center maintains, "We're confident that we haven't violated any laws," but, as far as is known, hospital officials have had nothing to say about the moral/ethical concerns in this matter.  Where is simple human decency?  Didn't somebody once mumble something about doing no harm?  Finally, does this story tell us something about the state of health care and of simple caring generally in this society?

If Sadd prevails in her lawsuit what do you think will be the result within the hospital?
(a) Heads will roll at the top.
(b) Nurses' salaries will be frozen for years.
or (c) Room rates and lab fees will go up.
Those of you who answerred (a) have no clue whatsoever about the way things really work.

All quotations and most of the information in this essay have been taken from an article in the June 7 New York Post. Unfortunately this story has gotten very little press coverage.  Perhaps it's not deemed fit to print, or perhaps the media moguls own stock in whatever conglomerate owns Brookhaven Memorial Medical Center.

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