TV host: ‘Hospital put my dying grandma in closet’

When Jenny Alversjö, a news anchor and host for Sweden's TV4, arrived at the Danderyd hospital in Stockholm to visit her dying grandmother on Monday, she couldn't believe what she found.

"Sitting at grandma's death bed – closet due to lack of beds, with a towel as a blanket because they are out of covers. Yippee 5th in-work tax cuts," she wrote on her Twitter account.

Sitter vid min mormors dödsbädd – i ett förråd pga platsbrist, med en handduk som filt då alla täcken är slut.. Hej 5:e jobbskatteavdraget.

— Jenny Alversjö (@Jenny_Alversjo) January 13, 2014

The tweet generated a sizeable response on social media and in the Swedish press.

The situation arose when Alversjö's grandmother had been moved to Danderyd from her care home on Sunday after her condition had worsened due to a skin infection and blood poisoning.

Speaking with the Aftonbladet newspaper, Alversjö detailed how her grandmother was sleeping on blood-stained sheets without a blanket, calling the situation "the worst I've seen".

"It's disastrous that conditions need to be so undignified at the end of one's life," she told the newspaper.

"People shouldn't have to die in a closet in one of the country's biggest emergency hospitals."

 Alversjö added that hospital staff members are doing a fantastic job and have testified to the stressful situation.

Danderyd spokeswoman Ingvor Farinotte attributed the situation to the large number of public holidays around Christmas. With municipal health authorities being unreachable, the hospital is unable to move patients who have completed their treatments back to municipal-run care facilities.