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Gruesome image shows hiker who was impaled on walking pole but trekked 10 miles down to avoid cost of helicopter evacuation (vt.co)
submitted 4 days ago by to c/aboringdystopia@lemmy.world
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[–] 35 points 4 days ago (4 children)

Ok, the headline leaves out the little detail that the hiker is a trained nurse, which was able to self-assess that if he wasn't dying already, that he has been fucking lucky with the path through the body.

But in every other civilized country they wouldn't have to be able to self-assess something like that, they would call emergency services instead of gambling with the possibility that some nicked artery or a wounded organ gets worse because of the trek - especially the path out on the lower back just screams "kidney injury" or "danger to the blood supply of that kidney".

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  • [–] 23 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    I know a lot of nurses and I've been an EMT for getting close to 20 years.

    The self assessment was "I can breathe. I can walk. I can not afford a $30,000 helicopter ride"

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  • [–] 6 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    It’s interesting they mention paying for a helicopter. Not sure how that works both in the US and in other “civilized” countries.

    But I suppose tax paying people need to decide on how to deploy emergency services. One could say if you take on the risk of climbing a 12,000 foot mountain, then you should be responsible for paying for your rescue. (Btw the article doesn’t directly quote him as saying he didn’t want to pay. Also there are other factors like you are then endangering the lives of the rescuers and possibly other hikers by bringing in a helicopter in such terrain.) Of course then there are people who would say if society doesn’t cover the cost of such a rescue, then only the wealthy will be able to “go on such adventures” or “do stupid shit” depending on your take on the activity. (See for example climbing Mt Everest.)

    So it was an interesting choice of the author to put that “pay for” phrase in there. Meanwhile people who get cancer through no fault of their own also cannot get treatment they can’t afford.

    But anyway yeah that dude is lucky he is a nurse.

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  • [–] 12 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    I live in Austria, we have our fair share of mountains. If it is a medical emergency like in this case, you won't get a bill. If you get surprised by a sudden weather swing that wasn't forseeable, you won't get a bill. If you are a stupid tourist wearing flipflops and getting lost in the dark on the mountaintop, you will have to pay. So personal responsibility is still there, but only as far as it could be expected from someone trekking onto a mountain.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 days ago* (1 child)

    There are no nurses in "other civilized countries"? What about the uncivilized? Do they?

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  • [–] 4 points 4 days ago (1 child)

    Your functional analphabetism is no concern of mine, but i will take my sentence apart for you:

    "But in every other civilized country they , "

    I hope this helps.

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  • [–] 4 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 child)

    I don't think that's the part of the sentence that's the issue - I read it the same way as the previous poster, and realise what the problem is. You said:

    But in every other civilized country they wouldn't have to be able to self-assess something like that

    On first read, it sounded like you're saying "they wouldn't have been able to self-assess something like that", whereas you're actually saying "they wouldn't have needed to self-assess something like that".

    Please remember that this is an internet where seemingly half of the Americans we meet are 100% convinced that the US is the only place in the world with cars, electricity, running water, etc. The assertion that the US is the only country with nurses capable of self-assessing injuries totally seems like something that someone would post.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 days ago (2 children)

    There is quite the distinction between "wouldn't have to be able" (as in "it would not be necessary") and "wouldn't have been able" (as in "incapable of") if you have any sense of grammar. I do make my fair amount of mistakes, as anyone does, and i am no grammar nazi at all, but i have to point out if someones ability to understand what i am saying seems to be lacking.

    Like i said, functional analphabetism (which the US suffers the most of in comparison to other developed countries) isn't my problem, it's the problem of the people who were neglected by their educational system and probably their parents.

    These people should be angry that no one thought it would be a positive thing if they could understand clearly what was said. But it's not me who they should direct their snark and anger towards. They should burn down the houses of the (mainly republican) politicians who have been dismantling the US education system für the last 60 years and demand better. That's not an action i can take for them to improve their situation. Don't shoot the messenger.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 days ago (1 child)

    wow calm your tits dude that was a joke. Maybe talk to your therapist about this

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  • [–] 1 point 3 days ago (1 child)

    Sorry, humor translates badly on the internet, same as sarcasm 🤷. And that i instantly thought that you weren't able to understand me because of educational issues makes it even worse... because the probabilities were in my favor. I wish it weren't so, but functional analphabetism is RAMPANT in the US, and that was before the Trump admin started demolishing everything that could be interpreted as intellectual.

    I am personally happy for you that this situation is not something that hurts you directly, but in my (limited) experience it makes a lot of sense to provide people with enough information to be angry about the status quo, because the might never arrive at it if they were left on their own.

    • About 70% of adults in the U.S. prison system read at or below the fourth-grade level, according to the 2003 National Adult Literacy Survey, noting that a "link between academic failure and delinquency, violence and crime is welded to reading failure."[9]
    • 85% of US juvenile inmates are functionally illiterate.[8]
    • 43% of adults at the lowest level of literacy lived below the poverty line, as opposed to 4% of those with the highest levels of literacy.[8]
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  • [–] 1 point 2 days ago* (1 child)

    love, I'm not american. English is not even my first language, and different from americans I can speak more than 1 language (5 in total).

    Before you tell me to "go back to my country", I also don'tt live in the US thank god

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