O'Hare Passengers Exposed to TB

By Margaret Lyons in News on Dec 30, 2007 8:00PM

Were you on flight 293 from Delhi to O'Hare to San Francisco on December 13th? Have you developed a bit of a cough? It could be because officials learned on Friday that a woman who had the drug-resistant form of tuberculosis was a passenger on your flight.

A 30-year-old resident of Sunnyvale, California, she was diagnosed in India this past August and according to reports, she was not in the dark about her condition:

"She certainly knew she had TB," said Dr. Marty Fenstersheib, the public health officer for Santa Clara County, Calif. "She had symptoms [coughing and fever] when she was on the plane. Was she advised not to travel? I don't know."

The CDC identified 44 people that sat near the woman and are at the highest risk, with several living in Illinois. Unfortunately for them, TB takes 8 to 10 weeks to incubate, so nobody will be getting a good night's sleep or uncrossing their fingers until sometime after Valentine's Day.

2007 -- the year of asshats flying with a deadly contagious disease. --Prescott Carlson [S-T]

Photo of presumably TB-free planes by p2wy