The Bizarre Toxic Death Of Gloria Ramirez

**The Bizarre Toxic Death Of Gloria Ramirez** is a video made by Ryan Bergara and Shane Madej, uploaded onto YouTube on December 3, 2016. It was the fifth episode of the first season of BuzzFeed Unsolved: Supernatural, and the thirteenth episode overall. You can find it here.

## Description

Unraveling one of the strangest deaths in medical history.

## Notable Events

This episode was the first to contain the famous insistence by Shane to investigate the deaths of the Dancing Plague of 1518, in which hundreds of French citizens literally danced until they died.

This episode also sparked the creation of Shane's alias "Garlicky Sheen Shane."

## Background

Gloria Ramirez was a thirty-one-year-old woman diagnosed with cervical cancer. On February 19, 1994, around 8:15 p.m., she arrived at the Riverside General Hospital emergency room, where it was found that her heart was beating at a rate too fast for her body.

The medical staff attempted to defibrillate her, but soon noticed that Ramirez's body was covered in an oily sheen, and that her mouth was emanating a fruity, garlicky smell. Susan Kane, a nurse, began to draw blood from Ramirez. Upon doing so, Kane noticed the blood had a chemical odor―and medical resident Julie Gorchynski noticed that the syringe, along with Gloria's blood, contained strange manila-colored particles, an observation also noted by attending physician, Dr. Humberto Ochoa.

Shortly after, Nurse Kane abruptly fainted. Kane stated that her face was burning, and was escorted out on a gurney. This sparked a "domino effect," where Gorchynski complained of lightheadedness and fainted as well. She also shook and experienced apnea, a condition where a person stops breathing for a few seconds at a time. Respiratory therapist, Maureen Welch, also collapsed, saying, "I remember hearing someone scream. Then I woke up. I couldn't control the movement of my limbs." Other staff also reported feeling sick, and the hospital declared an internal emergency. All other patients were evacuated to the parking lot, and a small crew continued to work to save Gloria's life.

Despite their efforts, at 8:50 p.m., Ramirez was pronounced dead. The body was moved into an isolation anteroom by two other staff members. Sallie Balderas, a nurse who had helped move the body, began to vomit, and reported feeling a burning sensation, similar to Nurse Kane. Balderas was hospitalized for ten days and experienced apnea, like Gorchynski.

Gorchynski, however, experienced the worst of all reported staff incidents. She stayed in intensive care, reporting a malady of issues, including avascular necrosis―a condition where bone tissue does not receive enough blood and begins to die. She used crutches for months after hospitalization.

All staff members that had been affected by Ramirez's body were treated in the parking lot. Their clothes were removed and put in bags, for fear of a toxic chemical in the air. Ramirez's body ended up affecting twenty-three of the thirty-seven emergency room staff. Five staff members were held in the hospital overnight.

Around 11 p.m., about two hours after the incident, a hazardous materials team arrived in full hazmat suits to search the hospital for chemicals that could be responsible. However, no chemical was found. Six days later, an autopsy was performed by the Riverside coroner's office in airtight suits, in a newly configured airtight examining room. They took samples of blood and tissue, as well as air from the body bed, but nothing conclusive emerged.

County officials called her death "the most baffling in local history," and the mystery became a media frenzy. By the end, medical detectives from ten different local state and federal forensic departments investigated the case. The official cause of death was declared to be cardiac dysrhythmia, caused by kidney failure due to Gloria's cervical cancer, and the case was officially closed. The onslaught of illnesses in the emergency room were still left a mystery, but the coroner's office declared it had been a case of mass hysteria.

Julie Gorchynski filed a lawsuit for six million dollars against the coroner's office in the hospital in damages for stating it had been mass hysteria. She claimed, among other things, that mass hysteria did not cause her avascular necrosis. Other hospital workers also filed cases. However, Gorchynski's case was apparently dropped. It is unknown what happened to the others.

Ryan and Shane explore Riverside Cemetery, where Gloria was buried. Shane sniffs for remnants of a fruity-garlicky smell, which he does not find. The two pay their respects, and then depart.

On April 20th, 1994, Gloria was finally buried in Olivewood Memorial Park in Riverside, California, two months after her death.

## Theories

* The emergency room illnesses were caused by mass hysteria. This theory was brought forth by the California Department of Health and Human Services, who interviewed thirty-four emergency room staff members.
	+ The Department pointed out that there was no poison in Gloria's system, and that no one in the ambulance on the way to the hospital had experienced any symptoms.
	+ Most cases of mass hysteria have an "environmental trigger" that sets off the symptoms―in this case, the "fruity, garlicky smell" could have been the trigger.
	+ However, Maureen Welch and Julie Gorchynski felt they had not been victims of mass hysteria, and Gorchynski even filed a lawsuit, saying her injuries had not been caused by it.
* The emergency room illnesses were caused by an overload of the compound dimethyl sulfone. This theory was brought forth by the Livermore Laboratory.
	+ The Laboratory discovered abnormally large amounts of the compound dimethyl sulfone in Gloria's autopsy samples. To explain this, they theorized that Gloria used an anti-inflammatory gel, called DMSO, to cope with her cancer pains, a common gel used by cancer patients. The gel would account for the garlicky smell and oily sheen.
	+ DMSO is one oxygen atom away from the compound dimethyl sulfone―the compound found in excess in Gloria's autopsy samples. The Livermore Lab performed a test combining DMSO with oxygen, much like the oxygen administered to Gloria that night. The result was an oversaturation of dimethyl sulfone, to the point where white crystals were formed, similar to the manila-colored particles seen in Gloria's blood by the medical staff that night.
	+ Dimethyl sulfone is still harmless, however―but the team theorized that if the dimethyl sulfone broke down, perhaps due to the electric shocks of the defibrillator, then combining with natural sulfate compounds inside Gloria, it could form dimethyl sulfate: a strong chemical that can cause damage to the heart, liver, and kidneys.
	+ Dimethyl sulfate also can cause paralysis, delirium, and convulsions. These are similar to the symptoms that the medical staff experienced. Therefore, the DMSO could lead to the odor, sheen, particles seen, and conditions encountered by staff.
	+ However, the theory that dimethyl sulfate was formed inside Gloria has been highly scrutinized by other scientists as impossible. The Livermore Lab did not run any tests to try and prove this theory or create a successful simulation. In fact, the head of the lab himself admitted it was only a theory: "We've never said this is what happened, just that people should look into it."
	+ The coroner's office released a statement in November 1994, stating this as the most likely cause.

* The emergency room illnesses, along with Gloria's death, were caused by conditions already present at the hospital, and that the case had been covered up by the county. This theory was brought forth by the Ramirez family.
	+ In 1991, three years before Gloria's death, two hospital employees were forced to receive medical treatment after a sterilizer leaked poisonous gas. In 1993, sewer gas was found in the emergency room in an inspection. Gloria's sister, Maggie, said that "I honestly believe my sister may have lived if she hadn't gone into that emergency room that night. I don't know what the county is afraid of, but we want answers."
	+ There are more strange occurrences: firstly, after the initial autopsy, Riverside County deputy coroner Dan Cupido said that Gloria had not died from natural causes. However, after the county revealed their official autopsy conclusions, Cupido claimed Ramirez *had* died from natural causes.
	+ Secondly, the initial investigator from the coroner's office, Stephanie Albright, a woman considered a top investigator, had committed suicide one month into the investigation. Cupido said that due to the case, Albright "may have been under pressure."
	+ Thirdly, the syringe used to take Ramirez's blood was accidentally tossed out, an oversight that is especially curious, considering the fact that the hospital took the time to put staff members' clothes in bags in the parking lot that night.
	+ Tom Desantis, the Riverside County spokesperson, claimed the vents in the emergency room were checked by independent inspectors after Gloria's death, and nothing unusual or harmful was found. These incidents, when looked out together, indicate a possible cover-up by the county.
	+ The Ramirez family also maintained that something was being covered up and filed a malpractice and wrongful death lawsuit against Riverside County.
* The emergency room illnesses, along with Gloria's death, were the result of alien abduction. This theory was posited by many on the Internet.
	+ UFO enthusiasts cite Gloria's unusual reaction with the emergency room staff as evidence of extraterrestrial meddling.

## Quotes

* Ryan: "I mean, could you even detect fruity garlic if it came down to it?"
	+ Shane: "I bet they talked about it for ten minutes, and were like, 'What is that?' And then one of them was, like, 'fruity garlic!' And everyone's like 'Ohhh, yeah!'"
	+ Ryan: "Either that, or they were, like, 'Jesus, Ken... God, we have a patient here.'"
* Shane: "It seems odd to evacuate all other patients."
	+ Ryan: "Why?"
	+ Shane: "Maybe just... send the stink bomb out to the parking lot?"
	+ Ryan: "Oh, that is true, why didn't they just take her out?"
	+ Shane: "It had to be a huge amount of work to move everybody else out. 'What if we take all of the patients outside and put them in the parking lot?' 'Yup, good idea!'"
	+ Ryan: "And then the one guy in the back is like, 'You know, we could just―'"
	+ Shane: "'Shut up!'"
	+ Ryan: "'Ah!'"
	+ Shane: "'You idiot, we've already decided!'"
* Shane: "Mm, this goes all the way to the top. I don't know if we should be looking into this, Ryan."
	+ Ryan: "Yeah, they're gonna come after us?"
	+ Shane: "Some stones are better left unturned."
	+ Ryan: "They're gonna come after us, with some oily sheen for us? That's their calling card?"
	+ Shane: "Oh, they're gonna―yeah! You're gonna wake up tomorrow morning and have an oily sheen on your chest! I can't wait till this story is over so I never have to say the word 'sheen' ever again."
	+ Ryan: (wheeze) "What is with you and 'sheen?'"
	+ Shane: "I don't like it, it's too close to my name!"
	+ Ryan: "You don't want the nickname 'Garlicky Sheen Shane?'"
	+ Shane: "No!" (wheeze) "No I don't!"
* Shane: "You know what happened... is the aliens probably abducted her―"
	+ Ryan: "Oh, I can't wait to see where this is going."
	+ Shane: "The aliens probably abducted her, the aliens were, like, 'All right, let's do our stuff, let's do all our little tricks on her! Let's put a... a little probe up her butthole,' or whatever they do, and then they probably started throwing up, and they're like 'Holy shit,' and one of them's probably, like, 'We should evacuate the whole ship,' and then someone was like, 'Fuck that, drop her off at a hospital!'"