PUYALLUP, WA — A Good Samaritan Hospital nurse who admitted to using narcotics meant for patients allegedly contributed to a hepatitis C outbreak that infected at least 12 people and possibly 30 others, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The nurse, Cora Weberg, who is identified in the CDC report simply as “nurse A,” may have been infected herself around Nov. 8, 2017, when she used narcotics meant for a patient with chronic hepatitis infection, the CDC said.
In May 2018, the Washington State Nursing Care Quality Assurance Commission suspended Weberg’s nursing license for 18 months “due to alleged diversion of controlled substances.”
In December 2018, an unidentified Edgewood resident filed suit against Weberg and her nonprofit employer, MultiCare Health System, a Tacoma-based healthcare services provider for dozens of healthcare facilities in Puget Sound and Eastern Washington.
In the suit, Weberg is accused of stealing the plaintiff’s “injectable drugs” and simultaneously exposing the plaintiff to needles tainted with hepatitis C. MultiCare is accused of knowing Weberg abused patients’ medications but not doing anything to prevent or stop it.
The accusations refer to a visit to the Good Samaritan emergency room in December 2017 following a car crash involving the plaintiff, whom the CDC identified only as a woman in her 50s.
Both Multicare and Weberg are co-defendants along with one other individual — who was also involved in the car crash — and the company for which that person works.
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Ultimately, it appears the plaintiff’s suit seeks restitution for damages caused by the injuries from the car crash and subsequent medical treatment from Weberg, which allegedly gave the plaintiff hepatitis C.
As for Weberg’s outbreak case, the CDC said she was on-duty at Good Samaritan when nearly 3,000 patients received injectable drugs between Aug. 4, 2017 and March 23, 2018, though Weberg herself did not necessarily provide direct care to every patient.
In April 2018, Good Samaritan sent letters to the 2,762 living patients who received injectable drugs while Weberg was on duty, including the 208 patients who were directly treated by Weberg, the CDC said. The letters notified the patients of possible hepatitis C exposure and offered free testing.
By Nov. 1, 2018, roughly 67 percent of the 2,700-plus patients had been tested, including 84 percent of the patients treated directly by Weberg. Of that 84 percent (175 individuals), 20 people tested positive for hepatitis C, 13 of whom had a hep-C genotype similar to that found in Weberg.
Of those 13 patients, 12 received injectable drugs from Weberg between Nov. 22 and Dec. 26, 2017. The one remaining patient is believed to be patient zero — the person from whom Weberg initially contracted hepatitis C during a Nov. 8, 2017, visit to Good Samaritan.
All patients who’ve tested positive for hepatitis C since the investigation began are now reportedly receiving care for their respective infections. However, there are still 33 patients who have not yet been tested.
The suit against Weberg, MultiCare, and the two other entities will reportedly go to trial on Dec. 12, 2019.
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