This past Sunday, a five-count lawsuit was filed against the Triage Staffing, Inc. for the outbreak of Hepatitis C at Exeter Hospital. They claim that it is this Nebraska based company that is responsible for the negligence that lead to the disease outbreak in the hospital. The claim states that the Triage company hires travelers to work in different hospitals throughout the United States, allowing them to stay for a short 13 week period before moving on to a new location. The main suspect in this viral outbreak is David M. Kwiatkowski who has worked as a traveling medical technician since 2007 and has worked in at least eight different states in that time frame. The lawsuit states that Kwiatkowski is being held responsible for the disease as a result of abusing stolen hospital drugs. It is said that he would use the drugs and inject himself then place the contaminated syringes to be used again by patients.
According to medical records, he was diagnosed as being positive for Hep. C back in 2010. In the lawsuit claiming negligence against the Triage medical company, they claim that they failed in their responsibility to protect the health of the members in the hospitals from his drug and negligent tendencies. This company also failed to do any background investigations to their employees, which would have allowed them to discover that he was unfit for the job. Fellow workers at the hospital claimed to have noticed that Kwiatkowski was likely on some form of narcotic based on his appearance and mannerism, though nothing was really done to prevent his working at the hospital. As a result of this lawsuit from the Hepatitis C outbreak, over 100 victims are participating in suing Exeter Hospital because of the disease breakout. Out of these 100 patients that were exposed, four have tested positive for the disease and are being represented by the same team of lawyers in order to fight for compensation for their misfortunes, and seek justice on those who were in the wrong.