European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - August 5, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse T hell on Romania s hospitals for irrecoverable by Chris Riback the associated press a Hearse waited at Hospital no. 2 in Bucharest for the body of Marioara Yonescu 89. She was a deaf mute an Quot irrecoverable a one of romanians lost souls. She spent her last years at Hospital no. 2, one of 67 institutions for disabled adults squalid places where communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu hid amputees the mentally ill and social rejects from Public View. The biggest problem in this kind of Hospital said or. Ovidiu Popescu is that with the Lack of help patients will leave Quot Only one Way in a such hospitals for adults Are comparable to the infamous orphanages for abandoned and mentally retarded children that were exposed after the execution of Ceausescu in december 1989. Families Send some of the patients to places like Hospital no. 2 because of accidents or illness. Other patients simply move from the orphanages at 18, living in institutions from Cradle to grave. _ Hospital no. 2 is considered among the Best but its conditions Are harsh. On the second floor a woman with the stump of an amputated Arm stood outside an open bathroom door while a mentally ill woman used the toilet inside. A paralysed woman of 80 Lay naked on her bed an Arm and leg locked in a runners pose. Five women occupied a room Down the Hall one in a coma receiving nourishment intravenously. Quot i think she will die tomorrow a said or. Petru Soare director of the Hospital. Patients defecate in their Beds then wait for someone to change their sheets and clothing. There is not enough pressure to push water above the first floor. Quot if these places were in the West almost All of them would be closed Quot said Sica Pavelscu of Equi Libre a health organization based in France. As bad As the situation is in the capital it is worse in the country at places like the Lucet Hospital of neuropsychiatry in Transylvania and Pla Aresti Hospital no. 4,. About 20 Miles Southeast of Bucharest. International health care workers describe scenes of hungry patients snatching bread off the floor and. Devouring it. Quot its hell on Earth Quot one said of a menus Ward. Quot no pants no soap dirt stench human suffering that never. Could have been imagined in the 20th the worker asked to remain Anonymous for fear of offending the government. Ceausescu a policy with the chronically ill called irrecoverable by his regime was to remove them from society through a policy of neglect. The current government has made some improvements but not much effect is visible. Or. Dan Cristescu director of the secretariat for the handicapped said its 1991 budget is $10 million nearly double the previous year. That comes to about $870 a year for each of the 11,500 patients. Quot we Are trying to improve their living conditions because we Are aware that some could make it Back in society a Cristescu medical staffs would help. Soare is one of Only two doctors at Hospital no. 2. They and 12 nurses care for 123 patients. At Pla Aresti Hospital no. 4, two doctors care for 220 patients with the Aid of 80 nurses who have no formal training Quot we have Many problems Quot said or. Marius Popescu of Pla Aresti. A we have no Light bulbs. Do you know what it Means for a Hospital to have no Light bulbs we also have no ambulance should someone need specialized few activities Are available for patients. At Bucharest Hospital no. 1, a Man who waddles on two stumps fixes clocks Quot to help pass the another Man wrote a poem about Ceausescu that says Quot god listened to our prayers. If you Are taking away the dictator done to forget his Many paralysed patients do not leave their Beds for months. At Pla Aresti some patients sleep two to a bed. Quot its a sad life Quot said or. Gheorghe Tanase director of the Pla Aresti Hospital. Quot their Joy comes from better food the fact that we listen to them and through visits from their families a when they come a maybe once a a patient starts into apace inside the Dungeon like bathing area of the Lucet Hospital near Bucharest. Dutch volunteers visit a seriously Iii woman in the Hospital where Many patients Are untended and sit or lie in their own waste waiting to drugged into submission and Clad Only in pyjamas Are allowed to sit in a Field surrounding the Lucet facility which has 50 children and 410 adults As patients. Seated patients at the Asylum bring to mind images of Auschwitz with their Blank stares and shaved Heads. Photos by Frederic Larson san Francisco chronicle seriously ill patients Are sometimes cared for by family members or led by other patients. Page 14 a the stars and stripes monday augusts 1991 the stars and stripes a Page 15,
