THE UNKNOWN: The Mysterious Case of Gloria Ramirez

In 1994, Gloria Ramirez was admitted to a hospital in Riverside, California, with a mysterious unknown illness. She had strange material floating in her blood, an odd sheen on her skin, and anyone who treated her found themselves falling ill as well. Gloria didn't survive, which only created more panic and confusion. To this day, there have been no concrete answers about what caused her death or the sudden illness of her medical team.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Speaker 00

  If you've been with us since the beginning, then you know we've covered a lot of mysteries on this show. Extraterrestrial life, ghostly occurrences, inexplicable disappearances. But what we don't talk about enough is one of the biggest, most underrated mysteries on this planet: us. More specifically, the human body. The reality is, we may have a basic understanding of how human anatomy works, but even the world's top scientists don't understand every nuance of how we operate. So you can see why the medical staff at Riverside General Hospital was baffled

• 0:45Speaker 00

  when they learned about Gloria Ramirez's case. In 1994, Gloria, who was living with late-stage cervical cancer, was admitted after her symptoms took a turn for the worse. But it wasn't just Gloria who had to be treated that night. After doctors and nurses had worked on Gloria, they also exhibited symptoms that couldn't be explained. Some said it was a case of mass hysteria. Others think that there is maybe a scientific explanation. But many use Gloria's case as proof that we still have no idea what really makes us tick. I'm Ashley Flowers, and this is So Supernatural.

• 2:01Rasha Pecoraro?

  Welcome back to So Supernatural. I'm Rasha Peccarero.

• 2:05Yvette Gentile?

  And I'm Yvette Gentile. And this week, we're sharing the mysterious case of Gloria Ramirez.

• 2:12Rasha Pecoraro?

  And before we get into Gloria's case, Yvette, I remember vividly, it was quite a few years ago now, that you had an incredibly scary and mysterious experience when you were in the hospital. Can you tell our listeners a little bit more about that?

• 2:28Yvette Gentile?

  Yeah, I actually, I haven't shared this with too many people, just, you know, close friends, but it was about two years into my marriage with Gino and we were doing IVF. And two days into doing the injections, I got so sick, like I started vomiting profusely. So I had to go to the hospital. And when I got there, they thought I had a bacteria infection. Then they ruled that out. Then they thought maybe it was meningitis. Till this day, we don't really know what happened to me. But for me, I think that I was overstimulated with hormones from the injections. And the day before, I went and I had a Reiki

• 3:12Yvette Gentile?

  massage. And I think that my fear, because I was so scared of doing the IVF in the first place, so I did the Reiki to kind of calm me down. Whatever was going on in my body, emotionally and physically, like I possibly could have just created this in my body out of fear. I don't know. And again, like I said, to this day, it was undetermined what the cause was.

• 3:35Rasha Pecoraro?

  It's still a mystery.

• 3:36Yvette Gentile?

  Still.

• 3:37Rasha Pecoraro?

  Yeah, I remember that was a very turbulent time for you and for Gino and for all of us as a family because we were so scared. It actually kind of reminds me of today's story. In 1994, Gloria Ramirez is a 31-year-old married mother of two. She and her family live in Southern California in Riverside, which is 60 miles east of Los Angeles. Gloria has a reputation for having a great sense of humor and she always knows exactly what to say to cheer people up and make them laugh, no matter what situation they're in. But in early January of 1994, she gets some bad news that even she can't laugh off. She's

• 4:21Rasha Pecoraro?

  diagnosed with cervical cancer. And unfortunately, by the time the doctors catch the disease, it's already very advanced. It's in the late stages. And doctors say her chances of beating it are slim to none.

• 4:37Rasha Pecoraro?

  Still, it's not a hopeless cause. Gloria plans to get treatment and of course she wants to fight the cancer. It's going to be a very long road with no guarantees, but she is willing to do whatever it takes to survive. Especially because Gloria, of course, wants to see her two children grow up.

• 4:59Yvette Gentile?

  Before she knows it, she's six weeks into her treatment. But come mid-February, Gloria feels very sick. She's throwing up, she's nauseous, and that lasts for several days. And then on February 19th, 1994, her symptoms get even worse. She's struggling just to breathe, and her heart is racing, and that night, she collapses. Her family calls an ambulance, which arrives a little before 8:00 PM, and they rush her off to the hospital, specifically Riverside General Hospital, a public hospital owned and run by Riverside County. And I mention this detail because it will be important later.

• 5:40Rasha Pecoraro?

  In the ambulance, the paramedics are doing absolutely everything they can for Gloria. Based on her symptoms, they think she could have a very serious infection or even an undiagnosed heart condition, which could be related to her cancer. But at this point, it's hard to say for sure. The paramedics follow all of the standard procedures for someone with Gloria's symptoms. This means, of course, that they put an IV into her arm, presumably to keep her hydrated or even to give her medicine. They put an oxygen mask over her face to help her breathe.

• 6:13Yvette Gentile?

  But by the time Gloria makes it to the hospital, it's 8:15. It's been almost half an hour since she first collapsed, but she's at least conscious now. The doctors rush her into the ER's Trauma Room 1, and they give her a whole bunch of drugs, some to stabilize her heartbeat and others to just relax her and manage her pain. They also set her up on a breathing machine, but none of the treatments seem to be helping. Gloria's pulse is skyrocketing, and she's still struggling to breathe. And when the doctors talk to her, the responses she gives are incoherent. That means it's time for more drastic measures.

• 6:56Yvette Gentile?

  The physicians use a defibrillator, and the idea is that the jolt will help the heart reset back to the normal rhythm. So the emergency room workers take Gloria's shirt off in order to get the paddles in place. But when they do, they're shocked to see this weird substance coating her skin. It's shiny and oily, but they have no idea what this stuff is. And around this time, the physicians also notice something else that's very weird about Gloria. Her breath has a very distinct scent. And all the coverage that I've seen says that it is this fruity, garlicky smell. The doctors say

• 7:40Yvette Gentile?

  they've never encountered this odor before. There are some diseases that obviously can cause bad breath. Diabetes can sometimes make your mouth smell like nail polish. And cancer, we know, because Mom went through this. Cancer can cause all sorts of problems with your teeth, your tongue, your throat. But this fruity, garlicky stench is impossible for anyone to place. And even more alarming, Gloria's condition is getting worse by the second. Some nurses draw her blood, hoping they can run tests and figure out what is making her so sick. But after they fill a vial with her blood, they notice there's stuff floating around in it. They have no idea what it is.

• 8:24Yvette Gentile?

  All they can say for sure is that there are tiny pieces of something that they describe as being manila-colored. So a sort of yellowy, beige-y shade. The nurse who draws the blood is named Susan Kane. She's working with a medical resident named Julie Gorchinsky. And Julie is so confused by these manila particles that right away, she shows the vial to the head emergency room doctor. His name is Humberto Ochoa. And even he's like, "Yeah, I have no idea what that could be." I mean, this is a symptom that's completely unheard of. But if they can figure out what's in Gloria's blood, they might be able to tell what is making her so sick.

• 9:09Rasha Pecoraro?

  And then maybe they'll know how to treat her. So Susan starts to head out of the ER to deliver the vial to the lab. She makes it all the way to the trauma one-room doorway. And then she collapses too.

• 9:28Rasha Pecoraro?

  I fell in love with Chime watching my beloved WNBA Portland Fire play this season because Chime is their VIP sponsor. A bank who supports women's sports instills confidence in my eyes. Most of us picked a bank when we were 16, got used to random monthly charges, overdraft penalties, and minimum balance requirements, and just accepted it as a part of life. But life adds up fast. That is where Chime comes in. Chime is completely changing the way people bank. Chime offers the most rewarding, fee-free banking with no monthly fees, no overdraft fees, and no minimum balance fees.

• 10:08Rasha Pecoraro?

  Plus, you get 5% cash back on your Chime card in a category of your choice. Join the millions who are already banking fee-free with America's number one choice for banking. Head to chime.com/supernatural. That is chime.com/supernatural. Sign up now. It only takes a few minutes. Chime is a fintech, not a bank. Banking services and Chime card provided by Chimes Bank Partners. Qualifying direct deposits required. Terms and limits apply. Go to chime.com/disclosures for details.

• 10:48Rasha Pecoraro?

  It's February 19, 1994. A Riverside General Hospital nurse named Susan Kane has just drawn blood from her patient Gloria Ramirez. But on her way to deliver that blood, Susan loses control of her body and passes out cold. Luckily, the ER's head physician, Dr. Ochoa, sees it happen. He rushes over to catch Susan before she can hit her head on the floor. But as he's doing that, he touches her face and notices her skin is burning up. It's almost like she has a fever. The good news is Susan's already in the ER, so she's immediately loaded onto a gurney and wheeled off to another room for treatment.

• 11:31Rasha Pecoraro?

  Once she's taken care of, Dr. Ochoa asks everyone else in the trauma room how they're feeling. Most of the people say they're fine. But then he gets to Julie, the resident who helped draw Gloria's blood, and she says that actually, she's feeling a little dizzy and lightheaded herself.

• 11:50Yvette Gentile?

  Dr. Ochoa tells Julie to go take a break and just catch her breath. So she walks out to the nurse's station and sits down. But she's not looking great. A passing hospital employee actually spots Julie and walks over to see if she needs anything. But before she can even answer, Julie slumps forward. She passes out, too. The hospital employee immediately calls for help, and now orderlies are loading Julie onto a gurney. And her symptoms seem even worse than her coworker Susan's, because her body is twitching and thrashing while she's struggling just to catch her breath.

• 12:28Rasha Pecoraro?

  Then, as Julie is being wheeled into the ER, someone else collapses in Trauma Room 1. This time, it's a breathing specialist who's been trying to help Gloria's lungs work normally. One moment, the specialist was fine. Then, out of nowhere, she dropped to the ground, unconscious. While they're being treated, a bunch of other doctors and nurses start complaining that they are feeling very sick, too.

• 12:55Yvette Gentile?

  By now, the situation is serious enough for hospital execs to evacuate the entire ER, other than Gloria, who's now being quarantined in Trauma Room 1, and along with a few other doctors who stay to keep working on her. But every other patient, doctor, nurse, and specialist, they all head out to a makeshift emergency room that's set up in the parking lot.

• 13:19Rasha Pecoraro?

  At this point, doctors are worried that everyone might have been exposed to some kind of toxic airborne chemical. Like, maybe that's what's causing this outbreak. So, everybody has to go through a very strict quarantine process on their way out of the building. First, they have to strip off all of their clothes. Then they're given clean, fresh scrubs to put on. Finally, their original outfits are wrapped up in plastic bags and shipped off to a lab to be tested. And we cannot overstate how quickly this all happens. It's only been about half an hour since Gloria came into the emergency room. And already, the place has been evacuated and everyone is quarantined.

• 14:03Yvette Gentile?

  Meanwhile, Gloria's condition is getting worse by the minute. The doctors are scrambling, but they still can't figure out what's wrong with Gloria. All they know is that she's getting sicker and sicker, to the point where at 8:50 PM, her machine flatlines. She's past saving. Gloria's official time of death is roughly 35 minutes after her arrival at the hospital.

• 14:32Rasha Pecoraro?

  That's when a nurse named Sally Baldairis gets her assignment. She's supposed to move Gloria's body out of the trauma room. Sally gets Gloria loaded up on a gurney, and she's just about to wheel her out of the room when, all of a sudden, Sally feels like her skin is just burning up. This is accompanied by a wave of nausea that's so bad, she starts gagging. Before you know it, she's also being loaded onto a gurney. Then she's wheeled out to the temporary ER for treatment.

• 15:05Yvette Gentile?

  By this time, the pattern is impossible to ignore. The first few doctors to get sick were all treating Gloria. Now Sally's ill after just handling her body? The common element in all of this is: Trauma Room 1. Something about this room is making people incredibly ill. So the hospital calls an actual hazmat specialist to put Gloria's body into a special, isolated room. It's totally off limits to anyone who's not wearing protective gear. Then the hazmat people scour every inch of trauma room one.

• 15:43Yvette Gentile?

  They test for things like bacteria, viruses, toxic chemicals, hazardous gases, mold, anything that could have come in with Gloria. Or infectious agents that might have been in the ER the whole time. But they find nothing. There's not a single thing in the room that could be making people sick. So if the problem isn't the trauma room itself, it must have been someone inside the room. Someone that's already been removed and put into quarantine. Like Gloria Ramirez.

• 16:19Rasha Pecoraro?

  It sounds wild, but the hospital officials are now thinking that Gloria somehow made her doctor sick. They just need to figure out how it happened. So they study her remains as much as they possibly can. She goes on to get three autopsies. The first one is February 25th, so six days after her death. And don't worry, the medical examiner who performs the operation wears a special airtight suit. But in addition to solving the mystery of this strange breakout, the medical examiner also wants to know what killed Gloria.

• 16:57Yvette Gentile?

  Yeah, and an obvious explanation would be that she died of her cancer, right? Except cervical cancer doesn't create manila particles in your blood or make your breath smell like a fruity garlic. In fact, there isn't any condition that the medical examiner can think of that would cause those symptoms. So they check around Gloria's body, looking for signs of other diseases. And cervical cancer aside, they can't find anything unusual. There's no sign of what made her sick in the first place.

• 17:29Rasha Pecoraro?

  To be extra thorough, they gather a bunch of samples to send off to a lab so they can do more detailed testing. These include vials of blood, bits of tissue, even the air from Gloria's body bag. When the lab sends the results back, it's the same answer. There is nothing abnormal about Gloria's remains.

• 17:50Yvette Gentile?

  The same thing happens during the second and third autopsies. Toxicology reports list all of the medications the doctors gave Gloria in the ER, but there are no other drugs in her system, no poisons and no signs of illness other than the cervical cancer, which the doctors already knew.

• 18:09Rasha Pecoraro?

  Even though there's no solid evidence, Riverside County comes to a ruling on Gloria's cause of death. They're basically saying, "Look, we don't have all of the data yet, but we're still going to draw a conclusion about the patient in our facility anyway." Which is wild to me because coroners list a person's cause of death as "undetermined" all of the time. But in Gloria's case, they apparently don't want to do that. Instead, here's what they say. They say that Gloria died of heart failure, which was triggered by kidney failure, which in turn was triggered by her cervical cancer. Again, there's nothing in her autopsy to prove that this is what happened.

• 18:53Rasha Pecoraro?

  But they also can't completely rule it out. It's also worth noting that kidney failure and heart failure can happen to people with advanced cervical cancer like Gloria had, but these outcomes are incredibly rare. So the officials basically decide that that's good enough to close her case.

• 19:11Yvette Gentile?

  Except this ruling doesn't explain those yellow specks in her blood or the oily sheen on her skin. And it certainly doesn't explain all of those nurses and doctors who got sick while they were treating Gloria. And we didn't even cover all of the illnesses that night. Because as the hours ticked by, employee after employee reported symptoms. From the time that Gloria was brought to the hospital until her remains were put in isolation, 37 different ER staffers interacted with her in some way, shape or form, right? And of those 37 people, 23 of them suffered from at least one symptom.

• 19:56Yvette Gentile?

  That's a huge number of people. And while some of the reports were minor, a few of them became seriously ill.

• 20:04Rasha Pecoraro?

  Five medics had to stay in the hospital overnight, and a couple even longer than that. Sally Balderas, the person who helped move Gloria's body after her death, wasn't released from the hospital for 10 days. The whole time she was hospitalized, she was struggling to breathe. Then there's Julie Gorchinsky, who helped draw Gloria's blood, and she's the one that first noticed the manila particles. She had to stay in intensive care for two full weeks. The whole time, she had breathing difficulties and problems with her pancreas, which most likely gave her a fever, vomiting, and a terrible stomach ache. On top of that, some of her bone tissue, particularly in her legs and knees, died.

• 20:48Rasha Pecoraro?

  Meaning, after her release, she couldn't walk on her own. Usually, this kind of damage can only be fixed with surgery. Now, I don't know if Julie needed an operation, but I do know she needed to use crutches for several months after being released from the hospital.

• 21:06Yvette Gentile?

  So it's obviously very important to figure out what caused Gloria's strange symptoms. Because again, this cervical cancer slash kidney failure slash heart failure explanation just isn't cutting it. And if Gloria does have some kind of contagious infectious virus, nobody wants to start spreading it around.

• 21:27Rasha Pecoraro?

  To be clear, lots of people are worried about this exact possibility. Because in the months after Gloria's death, she gets a lot of coverage in the news. And it honestly makes me super sad to say this, but she's given the nickname "The Toxic Woman." Naturally, people read these articles and get scared. No one wants to get an infectious disease, if that's what Gloria had. They definitely don't want to die how Gloria did, or get their medical provider sick with it. And if the officials don't know what caused all of this, how can they stop it when it happens again?

• 22:10Rasha Pecoraro?

  In April of 1994, two months after Gloria Ramirez's death, the Riverside County Health officials are too nervous to release her for burial. They still don't know if there's something on her body that's making people sick. And they're worried that if Gloria's friends, family, and other loved ones gather for her wake, or her memorial, or her celebration of life, they could be exposed to whatever was harming the staff at Riverside. Something lethal. But Gloria's family, of course, is furious with the hospital. They cannot understand how she could have been so full of life one day, and dead the next.

• 22:51Rasha Pecoraro?

  They're frustrated that none of the doctors can say exactly what was wrong with her, and they certainly don't buy the cause of death listed on her autopsy report. More than anything, they hate that they can't properly put Gloria to rest. Eventually, after a whole lot of back and forth, the hospital releases Gloria's body back to her family. They finally have her funeral in April. But this poses a different problem. With Gloria embalmed and buried, it's basically impossible to solve the mystery of what made her be called "The Toxic Lady." The next best option is to study all of those blood and tissue samples

• 23:34Rasha Pecoraro?

  the medical examiners gathered earlier. So around the time of the funeral, county officials asked for help from the state of California's Department of Health and Human Services.

• 23:46Yvette Gentile?

  They review everything, and in September of 1994, they think they might have an answer. The Department of Health Services concludes that the ER staff at Riverside General became ill as a part of, and get this, a mass sociogenic illness, otherwise known as "mass hysteria."

• 24:09Rasha Pecoraro?

  So if you're a longtime listener, then you know we've covered this phenomenon before. If not, check out Ashley's episode on the Dancing Plague and our episode on the Salem Witch Trials. We'll link those out in our show notes. But those episodes cover some other mysterious incidents which might be explained away as mass sociogenic illnesses. And I'll just say this, this situation is very different.

• 24:35Yvette Gentile?

  Okay, but here's the too-long, didn't-read summary. A mass sociogenic illness is a physical condition caused by intense fear or anxiety. Basically, a person gets so worried about something that they make themselves physically sick. That's what I said at the top of the episode, that I thought happened to me. Except, unlike, let's just say, an anxiety attack, mass sociogenic illnesses are contagious thanks to a weird quirk in our psychology. They spread among people who know each other really well and have a lot of empathy for one another. There's also some evidence that these conditions are more likely to impact women than men,

• 25:20Yvette Gentile?

  which makes a lot of sense because women definitely are more, most women, I should say, are more empathetic to others.

• 25:27Rasha Pecoraro?

  I think that actually makes sense. And in some ways, it does fit with the illness that spread around Riverside General Hospital on February 19th. The affected employees were people who worked long shifts with one another, day in and day out. And they probably felt very close to one another, even if they weren't necessarily good friends outside of work. And we know that the first people to fall prey to this strange, toxic sickness, and the people with the most severe symptoms, were all women.

• 25:57Yvette Gentile?

  But there's one piece missing from that puzzle. Every mass sociogenic illness needs a trigger. People don't just develop symptoms out of the blue. They need to already be under immense pressure and stress before they even get sick. And while it's very challenging to work in an ER, there was nothing especially stressful that night. Doctors and nurses are so used to treating seriously ill people, and even those who are sick as Gloria was, right? So when the Department of Health says that the illness was stress-induced, basically every affected doctor, nurse, and medic says, "That's impossible. They know how to keep their cool and be professional.

• 26:41Yvette Gentile?

  They aren't gonna freak out and develop symptoms over a fairly routine emergency visit." And in fact, Julie, the medical resident, takes serious issue with this theory. Because in her mind, it sounds like the county is saying that she's too emotional to do her job. And remember, her symptoms included severe... We're talking severe bone damage that prevented her from walking normally for months. It's hard to believe that it's all because she's stressed out. Well, Julie's suspicions are confirmed when she goes to see a specialist for her legs. Her doctor takes one look at her and says her symptoms could only come from one thing: inhaling something toxic or poisonous.

• 27:27Yvette Gentile?

  So she thinks there must have been a gas leak in Trauma Room 1. She also thinks the hospital failed on two different fronts. First, they didn't keep her safe from the gas on the night of February 19th, 1994. And second, they may have conspired with the Department of Health, maybe leading them to the conclusion of this mass sociogenic illness, which ultimately blames her for getting sick rather than taking responsibility themselves. Julie is so confident that there's a conspiracy unfolding that she ends up suing Riverside Hospital for $6 million.

• 28:06Yvette Gentile?

  At this point, officials need an unbiased third party to confirm this was not their fault. So they partner with a government lab called the Forensic Science Center. This center was founded after World War II to research nuclear weapons. But by the 1990s, they expanded the lab to help law enforcement with high-tech scientific methods. They employ some of the best and the top scientists in the country, even to this day. And they're used to working on high-stakes, high-profile government projects. After reviewing all of the evidence, the Forensic Science Center comes up with a theory, which they end up announcing in early 1995, about a year after Gloria's death.

• 28:51Yvette Gentile?

  And it's not the same theory that Riverside County presented. In fact, they reject the whole mass sociogenic illness idea. But before we explain what they do think happened, we have to warn you. It involves a lot of chemistry. So basically, the researchers think that Gloria might have been using a painkiller that wasn't prescribed to her. It's called dimethyl sulf oxide, or DMSO for short. And it can be taken orally or topically, depending on your ailment. Now, while DMSO can numb pain, it is also used as a solvent to clean grease, which sounds like something I personally would not put all over my body. No, thank you.

• 29:36Yvette Gentile?

  No, thank you. But starting in the 70s, DMSO became very popular with athletes dealing with sore muscles. And the problem is, it can have some pretty gnarly side effects. One study in the 1960s showed that mice who were given DMSO were more likely to go blind. So after that finding, the US government banned its use as a painkiller. But today, it is still used in stove cleaners. And I don't know if you've ever cleaned your stove, Rasha, because Vanna does all the cleaning. I don't clean. But it has this oily substance to it, you know, when you spray it in the oven. So people who want to self-medicate with DMSO are known to buy this particular cleaner,

• 30:18Yvette Gentile?

  then they rub it all over their bodies to numb themselves, which, here we go, could explain the oily sheen on Gloria's skin. But there's one other thing you need to know about DMSO. In terms of its chemical composition, it's very similar to dimethyl sulfate, AKA nerve gas. That's a chemical weapon that can make people very, very sick if they inhale it. And in some cases, even kill you. It is so nasty, it was used in World War I in gas attacks.

• 30:53Rasha Pecoraro?

  Which brings us back to the researchers at the Forensic Science Center. Because after they're done looking over Gloria's case, they think she might have been using DMSO to treat the painful symptoms of her cervical cancer. Then, on the night of February 19th, 1994, some kind of chemical reaction happened inside of her body that turned the DMSO into some toxic nerve gas? And that's maybe what made her and her doctor so sick.

• 31:23Yvette Gentile?

  But here's the problem. It's really hard for dimethyl sulf oxide to become dimethyl sulfate. First, you'd have to mix the DMSO with a high concentration of oxygen. Then you'd need to cool it rapidly. But as it turns out, that's exactly what the doctors did to Gloria's body after the 911 call. While she was in the ambulance, paramedics put on her oxygen to help her breathe. This might have made the DMSO in her blood bond with the oxygen, which could explain why her blood had those yellow-colored particles floating in it. And as for the temperature drop, researchers think Gloria's blood got very cool when the nurses drew it.

• 32:07Yvette Gentile?

  One second, it was in her nice, warm body temperature veins, and then the next moment, it was in a room-temperature syringe. And as it cooled, the blood in the vial turned into nerve gas. An unfortunate freak accident.

• 32:24Rasha Pecoraro?

  But let's talk about just how freaky this accident is. Because a lot of chemists think this whole scenario is pretty much impossible. In fact, after the Forensic Science Center releases their findings, a flood of letters come in from doctors, chemists, medical researchers, and other experts in the field. And a ton of them agree that this theory is absolutely absurd. Nobody has ever heard of DMSO turning into nerve gas in someone's blood or in any other context. There's no record of it ever happening before. And keep in mind, DMSO is a fairly popular home remedy.

• 33:06Rasha Pecoraro?

  As we said, lots of athletes and cancer patients use it. And none of them have ever spontaneously created nerve gas in their bodies. Speaking of which, there's also no sign of toxin in Gloria's autopsy. There is, however, another chemical in her blood, which is basically halfway between DMSO and nerve gas. But that chemical is totally harmless. And once again, there's no evidence of that substance ever turning into dimethyl sulfate in someone's body. I mean, even the Forensic Science Center has to admit that they've never seen this reaction before. And they can't prove that it's actually possible.

• 33:51Rasha Pecoraro?

  They straight up admit that if this happened in Gloria's case, it was only because of what they would call extraordinary conditions. And there's an even bigger problem with this particular theory. According to Gloria's family, she never used DMSO. So there's no way it could have gotten into her system unless, of course, she was hiding the fact that she was using DMSO for whatever reason.

• 34:17Yvette Gentile?

  But there may be one way to put this whole thing to bed. All they need is the vial of blood that they first took from Gloria at the hospital. The one with the little yellow particles that were floating around in it. Because again, the forensic science center researchers believe it was the blood in that vial that turned into nerve gas. So that particular sample is more important than any other blood sample that doctors took from Gloria that night. If there's dimethyl sulfate in that syringe, that means the forensic science center is right. But if there's no nerve gas, it means their theory is disproven, don't you think?

• 35:00Rasha Pecoraro?

  Absolutely. Except, at some point after Gloria's visit to the ER, that particular vial goes missing. Officially, the hospital says that no one realized it was important. So they just threw it away without thinking, I guess, which ordinarily would make sense. But in this case, it's sort of wild because they saved everything else. We're talking people's clothes, tissue samples, blood samples, the literal air in Gloria's body bag. I mean, why would they toss out the biggest, most important, key piece of evidence without a second thought? Unless, of course, it wasn't an accident.

• 35:45Rasha Pecoraro?

  Gloria's family believes that the hospital is covering up the truth about her death. Like, they might know exactly what killed her and made all of the doctors sick. But they don't want to admit the truth.

• 35:58Yvette Gentile?

  And there's some pretty compelling evidence to back that theory up, even outside of the missing syringe. For example, the first medical examiner died just a month after Gloria did, in an apparent suicide. The deputy coroner who took over the medical examiner initially said he did not think Gloria died of natural causes. He thought there was more to the story. But right after that, the county publicly ruled her cause of death as being kidney failure and heart failure related to her cancer. And right after that, the coroner walked back his claim. Now, he said that he agreed with Riverside County.

• 36:43Yvette Gentile?

  He said it was natural causes after all. It's almost like he's under a lot of pressure to just fall in line, say what they need him to say, right? And agree with the government investigators. Or he's scared to death to tell the truth, right? Basically.

• 36:58Rasha Pecoraro?

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:59Yvette Gentile?

  Why lie? What could the hospital be trying to cover up?

• 37:04Rasha Pecoraro?

  Well, the Ramirez family think the facility was dirty and unhygienic. In fact, a few years before Gloria's death, there was actually a toxic gas leak there. It was bad enough to make two hospital employees sick in 1991. Then inspectors found sewer gas in the hospital again two years later in 1993. This time, it was in the ER. So according to the Ramirez family, there might have been even more toxic gas in Trauma Room 1 when Gloria was brought back there in early 1994. Maybe that's what killed her and what infected all of her doctors and nurses. Afterward, the Ramirez family believed the hospital

• 37:47Rasha Pecoraro?

  didn't want to take responsibility for the outbreak. So they latched on to these wild theories about DMSO and stress-induced illness to avoid being held liable.

• 37:59Yvette Gentile?

  I will note that the executives at Riverside General Hospital have denied every allegation of a cover-up. And officials with both the county and the hospital say they did a full investigation after Gloria's death. They checked the whole facility for signs of toxic gas, along with other poisons or pollutants that could make people sick. And officially, they found nothing, which was a key detail in Julie Gorchinsky's lawsuit against them. Remember, she sued the hospital for $6 million for making her sick. But in September of 1997, her case was dismissed without ever going to trial. There just wasn't any proof that the hospital was at fault.

• 38:42Yvette Gentile?

  And that could be because Riverside County General didn't do anything wrong, or because they did a good job of hiding their legal culpability.

• 38:51Rasha Pecoraro?

  To this day, it's impossible to say what killed Gloria Ramirez and harmed those around her in such a short period of time. Honestly, I'm not sure we'll ever get all the answers. But in a lot of ways, her case hits home for so many of us, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The thought of not knowing how or when a spread will stop, or where it came from, can be terrifying. But it's also a reminder that when we work together, when we support one another, society can persevere.

• 39:27Rasha Pecoraro?

  But that doesn't change the fact that we still have so much to learn about the human body. And while science has certainly come a long way, our own biology may just be one of life's biggest mysteries.

• 39:51Rasha Pecoraro?

  This is So Supernatural, an AudioChuck original, produced by Crime House. You can connect with us on Instagram at @SoSupernaturalPod and visit our website at soSupernaturalPodcast.com. Join Yvette and me next Friday for an all-new episode.

• 40:11Rasha Pecoraro?

  So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?

• 40:17Speaker 03

  I've been having a hard time trying to explain what Midnight Burger is. How about I let them give it a shot?

• 40:23Yvette Gentile?

  Your podcast is amazing.

• 40:24Speaker 04

  It's such an amazing show altogether. You guys have actively ruined all other audio dramas for me. You can't get people to understand the humaning that happens in this damn show. Keep doing what you're doing, because it's awesome. You might not think it, but you are far more important than you realize. Thank you.

• 40:40Speaker 03

  At the nexus of all things, there is a diner. Look for Midnight Burger on your favorite podcasting app, or just go to weopenat6.com.