The Price of Compassion in Seattle
When a man arrived at the police station with a broken leg, the Chief of Police found the medical community unwilling to help without a guarantee of payment.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
A man was brought to the police station with his leg broken above the ankle, the result of a fall. The man was without means, and after lying at the police station for an hour without surgical attention, he was sent to the hospital. Chief of Police Rogers telephoned for Dr. Palmer, the city physician, but learned that he had gone over to Tacoma, leaving no one in charge of his city business. After exhausting every means to secure the wounded man medical attendance, and after being compelled to keep the man for hours at the station laid out on a table, the chief finally ordered him removed to Providence hospital, where, at Chief Rogers' request, the sisters said they would chance getting their pay from either the city or county. This statement of facts is disgraceful to the medical profession, who are bound by professional oath to render aid under such circumstances.
“The professional oath of a physician means something; it binds him who takes it to answer the calls of humanity.”
This incident highlights a perennial tension in Seattle: the failure of the private medical system to provide a social safety net, and the reliance on religious institutions (like the Sisters of Providence) to fill the gap left by an absent or indifferent municipal government.
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