They took away my posting privileges and basically said I couldn't post there anymore.
Rob Kall: That's an experience you've had, and my question is, has it changed your attitudes or beliefs since you've been through all this?
I don't think so. I pretty much feel the same way. I think maybe it has strengthened them a bit. A lot of people in the local area are not too happy with what I said, because I live in Bush country. But I have a right to say what I want to say and if they don't like it then they should leave to China.
Actually, the night shifts are kinda slow because of the curfew and people don't want to venture out after curfew because they'll go to jail. So basically, at night, only the really sick people tend to come in" During the day it's still pretty busy. It's leveled off. I think we're just seeing 80, a hundred or so. That first few weeks after, it was very intense.
Rob Kall: Did you see any patients who died?
There was a man who came in, and the thermometer would only read up to 110 and it said he had a 110 fever and it wouldn't go any higher. That was a friend of mine. The real heroes are my co-workers. Dr. Miranda had to work on that guy, Dr. Seglio, Dr. Patterson, the nurses. These people have really been working their butts off""the nurses, the staff. This to me is the saving grace of everything that has happened. We've had nurses, doctors, etc. from all over the country come in. They're not from FEMA, they're not from Red Cross. They just came in their own vehicles and they just got here. They flew and the drove. I had people who worked "ground zero" they worked the tsunami who just came""from California, from Michigan, from Minnesota, from New York from all over the country""any state you could name pretty much and they just showed up. They had their stuff packed and they got here. Then I hear stories of people who tried to go through one agency, the Red Cross or something like that, "well you're on hold. You'll have to take this class for a week and then we'll send you down there," and they're watching the news and seeing people dying and they're saying, "you know what, I'm not waiting. I'm going. And they left on their own.
Rob Kall: So they bypassed Red Cross and FEMA and they started getting to work.
They just came. They just came by the droves.
Rob Kall: Would you say that the work that got done there got done in spite of FEMA?
You hate to knock help because they have helped in a lot of ways""the Red Cross, FEMA, the Salvation Army, etc. But they dropped the ball in a lot of ways too. Those first four or five days were really bad.
The national guard was a tremendous help in maintaining law and order because the first few days there was looting rampant here in Mississippi. You heard about looting in New Orleans. There was plenty of looting here on the Mississippi coast. I witnessed it with my own eyes""just driving by and people are in a Radio Shack or K-mart and people are walking out with arms full of stuff. And that was before the national guard had a presence.
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