How America Lost Her Democracy

In late December of 1977, I was deported from Japan, having been injured in an accident aboard ship and treated for a hand injury in a Yokohama hospital.  Landing on a PanAm 747 at SFO, I was confronted with a passenger collapsed and unconscious lying a few feet from the exit of the jetway.  I looked around as deplaning passenger stepped around this slightly overweight mid 50's man, with concerned expression on all their faces, but with none offering assistance.  I stopped and began to examine him, discerning that his breathing had stopped, and so exclaimed his non-breathing status to the nearest departing passengers and requesting that relay info to the cockpit and gate.  My own right hand was bandaged, a fist ball of cotton bandages, as I was yet to receive a follow-up skin graft at the USPHS Seaman's Hospital in San Francisco.  I immediately attempted CPR, but my hand prevented me from performing its' proper administration.  Passengers continued passing by, watching my dilemma, but none stopping to assist.  At one point, he threw up into my face, but my futile and incompetent attempts yielded the expected result.  He died before competent medical personnel could arrive, roughly 20 minutes later.

I subsequently told myself that I should have stepped over or around his collapsed form so that perhaps a more competent form of aid could have been attempted or administered.