TB plane scare prompts search

2008-01-01 11:33

San Francisco - Health officials are searching for dozens of international passengers who may have flown from India and in the United States with a woman infected with a hard-to-treat form of tuberculosis.

The 30-year-old woman, who authorities declined to identify is recovering in a San Francisco Bay Area hospital. She arrived in San Francisco December 13 aboard an American Airlines flight that she boarded in New Delhi, India. The flight stopped in Chicago before continuing to San Francisco International.

Health officials said she was diagnosed with TB in India, but boarded the flight anyway. US officials have little authority over who boards incoming international flights. Such passengers are typically barred from boarding flights originating in the United States.

'She was coughing'

"She did have symptoms on the flight," said Santa Clara County Health Director Dr Marty Fenstersheib. "She was coughing."

About a week after the flight landed, the woman showed up at the Stanford Hospital emergency room with advanced symptoms of the disease. Hospital spokesperson Gary Migdol said that the woman is being treated in isolation and is in a stable condition.

Fenstersheib said the woman will remain hospitalised until she tests negative for the disease, which could take a least two weeks. Fenstersheib said her stay could last longer because she has a strain of the disease that resists the most common antibiotics.

Officials with the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention are asking health authorities in 17 states to contact 44 people who sat within two rows of the woman and urge them get checked for tuberculosis. The risk of infection is far lower than passing on influenza or the common cold, doctors said.

"TB requires pretty constant contact with someone," Fenstersheib said. Fenstersheib said about 1 to 2% of all tuberculosis cases are of the multi-drug resistant variety.

CDC spokesperson Shelly Diaz said the agency has not received any reports back. Diaz said it will take more than eight weeks to receive definitive results.

In May, a TB patient caused an international health scare when he flew to Europe for his wedding. There has been no evidence that Andrew Speaker spread the disease on the flights there and back.

- AP