3 ms·

The unsolved death of Gloria Ramirez

19 points by CharlesW 2y ago

cafard 2y ago
Runners would try to treat joint pain with DMSO back in the 1980s. It did not sound like something I wished to try.
- TomMasz 2y ago
  I tried DMSO for elbow tendinitis, it sort of worked but caused such intense itching that I found myself washing it off soon after applying. It's sold in farm supply stores for use on horses, so it's fairly easy to obtain.
supportengineer 2y ago
[flagged]
- dang 2y ago
  "Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
trhway 2y ago
DMSO easily penetrates skin, and i'd guess in both directions. And if she or somebody got something onto her skin, that may have gotten dissolved into her system. And DMSO penetrates various types of gloves with various degrees of success, so the staff working with her could by touching her have gotten that something too.
- buildsjets 2y ago
  I do my part, behind the scenes. Swabbing the handles of cop cars with DMSO mixed with LSD. https://genius.com/Dead-kennedys-dmso-lyrics https://genius.com/Dead-kennedys-dmso-lyrics No, you will not taste the lemon.
ElevenLathe 2y ago
This article is interesting, but the title is really really strange.
- dang 2y ago
  Agreed. On reflection, we changed both the article and the title - see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43697298 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43697298.
zer8k 2y ago
I don't really believe the bent on this article that the hospital was at fault. There's an implication that Lawrence Livermore was in some sort of cover up and I don't really buy that line of BS either. Its a tragedy someone with a horrible disease was taken by fake medicine (DMSO). I do find it weird that the explanation would be dimethyl sulfate production due to a defibrillator but stranger things have happened. If she really did use an incredible quantity of the stuff I suppose it's not entirely unrealistic to believe small quantities of gas local to the body could've been produced but not enough to spread even to the other end of the room. The only thing the hospital is liable for a mistreatment of her body by not immediately getting it to a place where it could be examined before decay set in. But, on the other hand, who can blame them. All they knew is they had a biohazard of unknown capacity. Anyone with any number of unknown, horrific, highly contagious diseases would be treated the same.
dang 2y ago
Normally we don't prefer Wikipedia submissions when third-party articles are available, but the submitted URL here (https://thartribune.com/the-woman-who-turned-a-hospital-into-a-crime-scene-gloria-ramirez/ https://thartribune.com/the-woman-who-turned-a-hospital-into...) seems a bit too sensational, and the Wikipedia article seems to have all the information, so I've gone the other way this time. There's also this article from 1995: https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/analysis-of-a-toxic-death https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/analysis-of-a-toxic-...
sD4fG_9hJ 2y ago
[flagged]
- bglazer 2y ago
  Stop posting LLM slop
kcplate 2y ago
It doesn’t mention it in the Wikipedia article but I think the X files episode “The Erlenmeyer Flask” was also partially inspired by and drew some details from this case.

19 points by CharlesW 2y ago

cafard 2y ago

Runners would try to treat joint pain with DMSO back in the 1980s. It did not sound like something I wished to try.

TomMasz 2y ago
I tried DMSO for elbow tendinitis, it sort of worked but caused such intense itching that I found myself washing it off soon after applying. It's sold in farm supply stores for use on horses, so it's fairly easy to obtain.

supportengineer 2y ago

[flagged]

dang 2y ago
"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

trhway 2y ago

DMSO easily penetrates skin, and i'd guess in both directions. And if she or somebody got something onto her skin, that may have gotten dissolved into her system. And DMSO penetrates various types of gloves with various degrees of success, so the staff working with her could by touching her have gotten that something too.

buildsjets 2y ago
I do my part, behind the scenes. Swabbing the handles of cop cars with DMSO mixed with LSD. https://genius.com/Dead-kennedys-dmso-lyrics https://genius.com/Dead-kennedys-dmso-lyrics No, you will not taste the lemon.

ElevenLathe 2y ago

This article is interesting, but the title is really really strange.

dang 2y ago
Agreed. On reflection, we changed both the article and the title - see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43697298 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43697298.

zer8k 2y ago

I don't really believe the bent on this article that the hospital was at fault. There's an implication that Lawrence Livermore was in some sort of cover up and I don't really buy that line of BS either. Its a tragedy someone with a horrible disease was taken by fake medicine (DMSO). I do find it weird that the explanation would be dimethyl sulfate production due to a defibrillator but stranger things have happened. If she really did use an incredible quantity of the stuff I suppose it's not entirely unrealistic to believe small quantities of gas local to the body could've been produced but not enough to spread even to the other end of the room. The only thing the hospital is liable for a mistreatment of her body by not immediately getting it to a place where it could be examined before decay set in. But, on the other hand, who can blame them. All they knew is they had a biohazard of unknown capacity. Anyone with any number of unknown, horrific, highly contagious diseases would be treated the same.

dang 2y ago

Normally we don't prefer Wikipedia submissions when third-party articles are available, but the submitted URL here (https://thartribune.com/the-woman-who-turned-a-hospital-into-a-crime-scene-gloria-ramirez/ https://thartribune.com/the-woman-who-turned-a-hospital-into...) seems a bit too sensational, and the Wikipedia article seems to have all the information, so I've gone the other way this time. There's also this article from 1995: https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/analysis-of-a-toxic-death https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/analysis-of-a-toxic-...

sD4fG_9hJ 2y ago

[flagged]

bglazer 2y ago
Stop posting LLM slop

kcplate 2y ago

It doesn’t mention it in the Wikipedia article but I think the X files episode “The Erlenmeyer Flask” was also partially inspired by and drew some details from this case.