# Did Correta King die in a fake hospital? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 1, 2006, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508 "2006-02-01T15:28:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![zuma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e9c0ed/32.png) [@zuma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zuma)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2006, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/1 "2006-02-01T15:28:47Z")
Well, this is weird… According to this story, the widow of MLK died in a mexican fake hospital practicing various quackeries. Maybe she was so far gone that someone decided that a one in a billion chance was better than nothing. > **[Clinic offers alternate treatments / Ex-convict founder accused of quackery](https://www.sfgate.com/health/article/Clinic-offers-alternate-treatments-Ex-convict-2505552.php)** > > Donsbach, who describes himself as a doctor on his Web site, has no medical degree, and... ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2006, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/2 "2006-02-01T17:07:10Z")
Sadly, there are several such clinics in Mexico, all of them dealing in ineffective treatments for desperate terminal patients. I once worked for a man who was dying of Hodgkins disease, and he spent a few weeks at an “alternative” clinic in Mexico. He came back spouting an assortment of pseudo-medical nonsense (such as drinking distilled water and switching his wristwatch to his left hand) and taking bogus pills by the handful. None of it helped him, and he died anyway. I can sorta understand somebody grasping at straws in that situation, but I wouldn’t do it myself. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/3 "2006-02-02T03:05:58Z")
Sadly, she’s not the first. Steve McQueen died of cancer at such a place, where he was enduring daily coffee enemas (how that was supposed to cure cancer, I have no idea). ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/4 "2006-02-02T03:45:29Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > Sadly, she’s not the first. Steve McQueen died of cancer at such a place, where he was enduring daily coffee enemas (how that was supposed to cure cancer, I have no idea). There’s a tasteless joke involving the line “He’s in the ground this morning” lurking in there somewhere… ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2006, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/5 "2006-02-02T05:09:14Z")
Her son told newsmen that she went there because doctors in the US had told her that her illness was terminal. Turned out they were right. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2006, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-correta-king-die-in-a-fake-hospital/342508/6 "2006-02-04T02:47:17Z")
\*\*Did Correta King die in a fake hospital? \*\* Yes. [http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/tijuana/20060203-9999-2m3clinic.html](http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/tijuana/20060203-9999-2m3clinic.html) > [@](#): > > Clinic where King died being closed > > UNION-TRIBUNE > February 3, 2006 > > TIJUANA – U.S. consulate officials were notified by Mexican authorities yesterday morning that the alternative health clinic where Coretta Scott King died this week is being closed and the remaining U.S. patients are being ordered to leave. > > … > Mexican health officials were unavailable last night. Mexicali newspaper La Cronica was reporting that Baja California health officials said Hospital Santa Monica was being closed because it did not have proper authorization to provide unconventional treatments. Worse than I thought, there are clinics were this is authorized but these quacks did not even have a permit.