HOW THE HELL DOES A HOSPITAL RUN OUT OF BLANKETS?

By Bob Walsh

PACOVILLA Corrections blog
December 14, 2014

CHCF (California Health Care Facility, the mega-prison hospital complex outside of Stockton) has another problem. Their more or less new heating system went toes-up again and…..wait for it…..they ran out of blankets.

It has been chilly in Stockton recently. Today it didn’t get above 56 degrees, which is chilly, especially if you are living in a concrete box. How grotesquely incompetent is that? I realize that stuff happens. Heating systems break down, sometimes even new ones (though they shouldn’t). How the hell does a hospital run out of blankets?

Is anybody going to try to find out who screwed the pooch on this one? Unless it was the federal receiver, which I sort of doubt, you know how many cells you have. You know how many blankets you might need if your heating system crashes.

I grant you that a couple of thousand blankets cost some money and takes up storage space, but a lot of what a prison, a hospital, and therefore a prison hospital must do is plan for contingencies. Somebody didn’t.