Firefighters rescued yesterday Alejandro B., a 48-year-old man who lived trapped among the garbage in the basement of a block of flats in El Prat de Llobregat (Barcelona). The police received a warning at eight thirty in the morning that the man had fallen in the house, had not eaten or drunk for several days and needed help. Police reports indicate that he weighs more than 250 kilos and that he has not left his house since the pandemic, when he began teleworking. The City Council last assisted him in October last year, when neighbors alerted to the situation. "He intervenes with the Medical Emergency System (SEM) and the Firefighters, says he is fine and does not let anyone enter the home," explains Arnau García, responsible for social and community action of El Prat.
The rescue lasted a total of seven hours. Since half past eight, with an excavator and through the window, firefighters have been removing bags, plastics, boxes and other garbage accumulated in the home of the man, who allegedly suffers from Diogenes syndrome. Finally, at noon, the specialists reached him, as the journalist Anna Punsí has advanced. After checking that he was well and placing oxygen, due to the difficulties he had to breathe, the firefighters have begun the rescue maneuvers, which have culminated after three in the afternoon, when they have managed with a forklift to remove him from the house through the window. Firefighters have intervened with masks and biohazard suits. Police sources add that they had never acted in such an extreme situation.
A bulldozer works in the house of the rescued man. Courtesy photo
"It's outrageous," criticized one of Alejandro B.'s neighbors, who lives on the same floor where he lived with his parents until they died. He regretted that the social services and the police did not act in the face of a clear case of illness. "They spoke on the phone with him and were satisfied when he told them he was fine," insists this man who, like other neighbors, asks not to be identified. Before the pandemic, they explain that Alejandro B. went to work at the airport, where they say he worked as a computer scientist. "A van would bring him and take him, and just the four steps to his house, on the ground floor, took him 20 minutes," he recalls. With the pandemic, he never went out again.
The Consistory began treating Alejandro B. in 2003. An initial file was then opened. "He was visited at home, it was found that he suffered from morbid obesity and some accumulation of things," explains García. In 2012, the social services intervened again in the face of a worsening situation of Alejandro B., whom they treated for two years "until the situation was considered normalized". In 2015, a "shock cleaning" of the house was carried out in the same framework. They have not detected "any anomalous situation" since then.
A firefighter of the Generalitat works inside the house. Courtesy photo
The neighbors, however, assure that they raised the alarm on several occasions. The Consistory has four notices, in 2015, in 2018 and in October 2022, when they return to the home again, but Alejandro B. did not open the door. "There is no indication of unhealthiness or bad smell, the neighbors only alert us that they do not see it," says García. When he finds that he is at home, he supposedly well, he says, no further action is taken. In the building, on the other hand, they relate a serious concern for the health of the man, with whom they spoke loudly from the door, because he did not come out. "He replied that he was fine, and we couldn't do much else," they explain on the staircase.
Alejandro B. is admitted to the Bellvitge hospital, without fearing for his life, according to police sources. The City Council is "in very close coordination" with the toilets, to see its evolution. "You have to analyze if you can return home or if you need an admission to a social health center," explains García. The technician does regret an indication that they overlooked because it never came to the knowledge of the municipal services: it had been years since Alejandro B. collected the medicines at the pharmacy. "It's something that could have set off alarm bells," Garcia admits.
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