Athena fell six floors and barely survived.
At a veterinary clinic in Aosta, Italy, they gave her little hope. But her owner, Gianluca Fanelli, is not just anyone: he is the director of radiology at Umberto Parini Hospital. Convinced that he could still save her, he took her to the hospital at night, when there were no patients waiting, and performed a full CT scan on her. What he found was serious: a pneumothorax. So he operated on his cat right there, in the angiography room.
Athena survived. But the hospital found out, opened an internal investigation, and referred the case to the Aosta prosecutor’s office. Fanelli could face charges for misuse of public funds and offered to pay out of his own pocket if the procedure incurred any costs. Even his wife, Senator Nicoletta Spelgatti, came out publicly to defend him.
The story divided the internet in half: some see a professional who used his knowledge to save a life in a genuine emergency, while others insist that the resources of a public hospital, whether occupied or not, have only one possible purpose.