*This is a long one*
First, full disclosure--the Dr. in question is a med classmate of my sister's, and we hold her in very high regard. My 95 year old great aunt and godmother passed away in the same hospital just the month before, when the hospital was preparing for a possible hit from Hurricane Dennis (which went east). My family could easily have been like those of the patients who died during the storm. I thank God that we were spared such horrific conditions. The medical staff then gave my aunt whatever she needed to be a little more comfortable--pain meds, breathing treatments, oxygen. She was made more comfortable by those measures, but we knew that her life was ending.
I am a NOLA native. The following things were all in the local media, though I don't know if they made it nationally. I'm not posting sources, but I'd suggest nola.com (Times-Picayune newspaper) or wwltv.com (CBS affiliate), if you'd like to look things up.
One thing I'd like to point out is that no one knows if these patients died from a "mercy euthanasia", or if these medically fragile patients succumbed to the conditions. Patients (and people in the general public) were dropping like flies in the heat and humidity. Shortly after the storm, rumors of "patients being put down" were coming out; I remember a few in the media were laypeople who "saw" and "heard" tidbits of situations. Dozens of people were dying--in a HOSPITAL! This goes against people's core beliefs, and I believe some people are looking for an explanation and someone to blame, when in reality, it was the post-storm conditions at the root.
Now, for those of you in the more temperate regions of our nation, let me explain what I mean by heat and humidity. If you think the recent heat wave that spread across the country was "hot"--we in Louisiana have those temperatures as a NORMAL summer temp. Humidity? When there is 90%+ humidity, it is truly like a sauna. You will sweat just standing in place.
Why is this important? Because of the stress it puts on the body. Imagine yourself in those conditions for one day; young and healthy, you're miserable. Now imagine a medically fragile individual in those conditions--it's perilous. Now imagine those conditions going on for days.
There was no electricity; think of all the equipment in a hospital that runs off of electricity. Generators that were not flooded ran out of fuel in just a few days.
These were patients who probably could not have lived without the support of a modern hospital. One hundred years ago, they would have died. This storm caused conditions that basically shut down any semblence of modern life, and modern medical care.
A few more facts of what happened during the storm: Tenet owned Memorial (they're selling three of their local hospitals to Ochsner now). Tenet sent a convoy of supplies to their hospitals. Those supplies were confiscated by FEMA (and went to ???). Helicoptors for evacuations were also sidetracked. It took days, in the above conditions, for helicoptor evacuations to begin.
But what about other places in the city? The airport was set up as a field hospital and they went into mass casualty mode. People were triaged and the medically fragile were put in a quiet corner to die. It was all that could people could do with the very little supplies at hand. People were dying at the Convention Center and on the street. There were people who died in their attics from the heat, not from drowning.
As tulane06 stated, this is a political witch hunt. "Someone has to pay", and instead of going after the Corps of Engineers or FEMA, Foti is charging a doctor and two nurses who had no resources left and were doing the best they could in that hellhole.
For those of you in other parts of the country, a disaster like this could easily happen in your city--earthquakes, volcanoes, fire, terrorism. If or when it does, the lesson we have learned here is that YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN. You cannot depend on the federal government to help you. In this day and age, they are too cumbersome and political to engage in effective aid of a disaster situation. They couldn't even get supplies into an American city. How hard would it have been to airdrop food, water and medical supplies at the Convention Center, Superdome and hospitals. There was nothing.
Here is a release from LSUHSC School of Medicine, where Dr. Pou is on faculty. This is from wwltv.com--
The following is a statement by Dr. Daniel Nuss, Chair of the LSUHSC Department of Otorhinolaryngology regarding Pou's reassignment.
Dr. Anna Maria Pou is a distinguished ENT surgeon and teacher, who has earned national recognition for her contributions to the field of Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgery. Dr. Pou was on duty at New Orleans' Memorial Medical Center during the week of hurricane Katrina last year. The city was inundated with floodwaters, the hospital was left without power in 100-degree-plus heat, and the prevailing conditions were absolutely desperate. As most people know, there was no rescue for people left behind until almost a week after the hurricane.
Dr. Pou worked tirelessly for nearly six days helping the seriously ill patients and also the hundreds of people who sought shelter in the hospital. The conditions were unspeakably poor, and in the soaring temperatures with no water or food, many patients (nearly 40 individuals) died, despite great effort to save them. The majority of those patients were elderly people who had been admitted to the hospital's LifeCare unit, a place typically reserved for long-term care and for terminally ill persons. Some of the others who died were frail older people who had been transferred to Memorial from area nursing homes. A few were younger people who succumbed to lesser illnesses that were exacerbated by the extreme state of affairs.
By personal accounts from nurses, doctors, administrators, and support personnel who knew Dr. Pou, and had worked with her closely in the months before Katrina, her work during the crisis was "heroic,² "selfless,² and "distinguished.² With other dedicated doctors and nurses, she worked without sleep and without nourishment, and she declined an early opportunity to evacuate the hospital in order to care for those who still needed help. At great self-sacrifice, she prevented further loss of life and has been credited with saving multiple people from dying.
Apparently there were individuals in the hospital who could not understand why so many people were dying. Allegations were made, egregiously accusing Dr. Pou and the others of giving too much narcotic pain medication, and even using the word "euthanasia.² This attracted national news coverage, which became absurdly sensationalistic. Because of the widespread news coverage, an official investigation was launched.
Dr. Pou was arrested for second degree murder, along with two nurses, who also had impeccable reputations prior to these allegations.
It is my personal expectation that once all the facts are known, Dr. Pou will be recognized as one of several compassionate, dedicated professionals who did the best they could do under desperate circumstances, and that all allegations of misconduct will be shown to be unfounded.
) you'd probably know this or have an easier time looking it up than myself. Perhaps a law should be introduced stating that when a (terminal ?) patient is admitted to a care-center some paperwork should be signed by either the patient or decision-maker regarding sedated or "natural" death in emergencies? Might help avoid this in the future. 
