Life or Death
The staff of The New Orleans Times-Picayune continues to produce impressive coverage of Hurricane Katrina's aftermath as the first anniversary of the terrible storm approaches. This week it's running "For Dear Life" by Jeffrey Meitrodt, which gives a blow-by-blow account of the catastrophe that befell the city's Memorial Medical Center, where Dr. Anna Maria Pou and two nurses are accused of killing four elderly patients after the hurricane. Meitrodt's masterful narrative vividly describes the hellish conditions endured by the hospital's patients, doctors, nurses and chaplain and explores the painful decisions some of them made.