New Orleans Hospital Settles Katrina Deaths Class Action

A major New Orleans hospital has reached a class action lawsuit settlement with the families of dozens of patients, employees and visitors who died in the hospital during Hurricane Katrina. Tenet Health Systems (THC), which owns Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans, reached the class action settlement Wednesday, just as lawyers were selecting the jury for what was slated to be a 6-week trial.

The plaintiffs in the Tenet Health Systems class action lawsuit settlement are family members of people who died at Memorial Medical Center, employees of LifeCare Hospitals (a health care company that leased space from Tenet), and visitors to the hospital who were trapped by the storm, which left 85 percent of New Orleans underwater in August 2005.

The plaintiffs in the Hurricane Katrina class action lawsuit accused Tenet of being unprepared for the storm, which flooded the first floors of the building and inundated the hospital’s backup generator. Without electricity from the generator, temperatures inside the hospital rose above 100 degrees. Plaintiffs in the class action claimed Tenet should have had an emergency backup plan for loss of power, and should have followed proper evacuation plans.

In all, more than 2,000 people, including hospital staff, patients and storm survivors off the street who sought shelter in the hospital waited four days to be evacuated from the hospital. All were airlifted from the rooftop since the entire area surrounding the hospital was underwater. Forty-five people died in the hospital before being rescued – the largest number of deaths in any hospital in New Orleans during the storm.

Rick Black, a spokesman for Tenet, said in a statement: “This has been a long and difficult situation for all concerned, but the parties are pleased to be able to announce that an amicable resolution has been reached subject to court approval at a later date.”

The terms of the Memorial Medical Center settlement were not announced.