Yesterday, I received email from Ianthe Livadas. Ianthe was removed as her mother’s guardian in a dispute with Strong Memorial Hospital here in Rochester. This is part of what she wrote:
…her current attending (he doesn’t even know her) just told me that CFC has decided that my mother should be disconnected, and that the hospital administration has decided that it will be done at 12:30 p.m tomorrow (Friday, August 29, 2008).
This was reconfirmed later in the day, when WHAM-13 aired a short story announcing the impending death of Dorothy Livadas.
The timing of this would appear to pretty strategic. Anyone who is a political cable news junkie knows about the “Friday news dump.” News “dumped” on a Friday minimizes news coverage – news readership of papers is down, news stations aren’t staffed as well. By the time Monday comes, the news is stale and no longer news at all.
Strong Hospital and the Catholic Family Center picked a perfect Friday for minimizing any attention being given to the death of Dorothy Livadas. The media is focussed on Obama’s acceptance of the Democratic nomination last night and the announcement of McCain’s VP pick today. Not to mention an approaching hurricane down in the Gulf. And it’s a three-day weekend. It’s a good move in terms of burying a story you don’t want covered.
By the time most people read this, Dorothy Livadas will almost certainly be dead.
I can’t claim to know what Dorothy Livadas would want, but I do know that the legal moves, the word games with “brain death” and the cold media calculations over the timing of her death leave me with a cold and queasy feeling. –Stephen Drake