Nation & World Glance
Shortage of intubation drugs threatens Brazil health sector
RIO DE JANEIRO – Reports are emerging of Brazilian health workers forced to intubate patients without the aid of sedatives, after weeks of warnings that hospitals and state governments risked running out of critical medicines.
One doctor at the Albert Schweitzer municipal hospital in Rio de Janeiro told the Associated Press that for days health workers diluted sedatives to make their stock last longer. Once it ran out, nurses and doctors had to begin using neuromuscular blockers and tying patients to their beds, the doctor said.
“You relax the muscles and do the procedure easily, but we don’t have sedation,” said the doctor, who agreed to discuss the sensitive situation only if not quoted by name. “Some try to talk, resist. They’re conscious.”
Lack of required medicines is the latest pandemic problem to befall Brazil, which is experiencing a brutal COVID-19 outbreak that has flooded the nation’s intensive care units. The daily death count is averaging about 3,000, accounting for a quarter of deaths globally and making Brazil the epicenter of the pandemic.
“Intubation kits” include anesthetics, sedatives and other medications used to put severely ill patients on ventilators. The press office of Rio city’s health secretariat said in an email that occasional shortages at the Albert Schweitzer facility are due to difficulties obtaining supplies on the global market and that “substitutions are made so that there is no damage to the assistance provided.” It didn’t comment on the need
Dow Jones Industrials: +305.10 to 34,035.99 Standard & Poor’s: +45.76 to 4,170.42 Nasdaq Composite Index: +180.92 to 14,038.76 to tie patients to beds.
Wright’s family wants stiffer charge for Minnesota ex-cop
BROOKLYN CENTER, Minn. – Daunte Wright’s family members joined with community leaders Thursday in calling for more serious charges against the white former police officer who fatally shot him, comparing her case to the murder charge brought against a Black officer who killed a white woman in nearby Minneapolis.
Former Brooklyn Center police Officer Kim Potter was charged with second-degree manslaughter in Sunday’s shooting of Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, during a traffic stop. The former police chief in Brooklyn Center, a majority nonwhite suburb, said Potter mistakenly fired her handgun when she meant to use her Taser. Both the chief and Potter resigned Tuesday.
Potter – who was released on $100,000 bond hours after her arrest Wednesday – appeared alongside her attorney, Earl Gray, at her initial appearance Thursday over Zoom, saying little. Gray kept his camera on himself for most of the hearing, swiveling it to show Potter only briefly. Her next court appearance was set for May 17.
Wright’s death has been followed by protests every night this week outside the city’s police station, with some demonstrators hurling objects at officers who have responded at times with gas and rubber bullets before clearing the scene with a riot line. Hundreds of protesters gathered again Thursday night, shouting obscenities at police and shaking the security fence, hours after police in Chicago released graphic body camera video of an officer fatally shooting 13-year-old Adam Toledo in March.
“It is happening in every single city, every single day across the country,” Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told protesters earlier in the evening, before leading them in a chant of “Say his name! Adam Toledo!””
BY THE NUMBERS
Former VP Pence undergoes surgery to implant pacemaker
WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Mike Pence has undergone surgery to have a pacemaker implanted.
His office says that Wednesday’s procedure went well and that Pence “is expected to fully recover and return to normal activity in the coming days.”
The 61-year-old Pence, who recently launched a new advocacy group and signed a book deal, had previously been diagnosed with a heart condition called asymptomatic left bundle branch block.
His office says that, over the past two weeks, he experienced symptoms associated with a slow heart rate and underwent the procedure in Virginia in response.
Pence is considered a likely 2024 presidential candidate if former President Donald Trump declines to run again.
He is expected to deliver his first public speech since leaving office later this month in South Carolina.
Princes William, Harry won’t walk side-by-side at funeral
LONDON – Prince William and Prince Harry won’t walk side-by-side Saturday as they follow their grandfather’s coffin into the church ahead of Prince Philip’s funeral, minimizing the chances of any awkward moments between the brothers who are grappling with strained relations since Harry’s decision to step away from royal duties last year.
Buckingham Palace on Thursday released the broad outlines of the funeral program for Queen Elizabeth II’s husband, who died April 9 at 99. The palace revealed that William and Harry’s cousin, Peter Phillips, will walk between the princes as they escort the coffin to St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle, west of London.
Prince Charles, the heir to the throne and the father of the princes, together with his sister, Princess Anne, will lead the 15-member procession.
The brothers had been closely watched as Saturday’s funeral will almost certainly remind the pair of their shared grief at another royal funeral more than two decades ago. As young boys, both walked behind their mother Princess Diana’s coffin in 1997 in London in a ceremony watched around the world.
Palace officials refused to comment when asked whether the positioning of William and Harry was an effort to minimize family tensions, which have grown after Harry and his wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, gave an explosive interview to Oprah Winfrey that suggested an unnamed member of the royal family had made a racist comment to Harry before the birth of their child Archie.