Imagine rushing your father to the hospital with pneumonia—only to find his hospital room hotter than your apartment. That’s exactly what happened to Diane O’Connell at Weiss and West Suburban Hospitals in Chicago. Her father, already fighting to breathe, was left in a sweltering room with no airflow and temperatures climbing past 88 degrees.

This isn’t a one-time crisis. Multiple hospitals across Chicago—including Provident in Bronzeville—are failing their patients during an intense heatwave. Air conditioners are broken. Temporary cooling units are failing to keep up. And patients—many of them elderly or disabled—are being shuffled around or discharged early because their rooms are too hot to be safe.

This isn’t just uncomfortable. It’s dangerous, negligent, and deeply unfair to families who trust these hospitals with their loved ones’ lives.

We’re calling on Resilience Healthcare, Cook County Health, and city and state officials to fix this now. Emergency repairs. Independent inspections. Real consequences for systems that let this happen again.

You shouldn’t have to worry about your hospital making your condition worse. Sign this petition to demand safe conditions for every patient—before the next heatwave hits.