A photo of an Australian paramedic helping a dying woman fulfill her wish to see the ocean one last time has touched people’s hearts around the world.
The grainy photo of paramedic Graeme Cooper looking out over the Coral Sea doesn’t look like much at first glance. But in just one day it had been shared by tens of thousands of people around the world who were touched by the kind gesture it captures.
In the picture, Cooper stands next to a stretcher on the beach at Hervey Bay, Queensland. On that stretcher, hidden from view, is an elderly patient who he had been taking to palliative care—until she started talking about how she wished she could see the beach again.The ambulance crew decided to fulfill her wish, taking a diversion to Hervey Bay, where they took the stretcher as close as they dared to the water’s edge.
