Friday, June 01, 2007

Chicago Sun-Times Editorial - TB case shows flaw in nation's security

Chicago Sun-Times Editorial - TB case shows flaw in nation's security
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
June 1, 2007


We'd like to think, in light of the fact there have been no acts of terror on domestic soil since 9/11, that our homeland security systems are mostly doing what they're supposed to be doing. And maybe they are. But any sense of safety we feel is eroded by the knowledge that all it takes is one human or technological slip, one distracted baggage checker, one un-tapped database, for someone intent on causing mass harm to Americans to get that opportunity. Until those systems are upgraded and improved, there can be no lasting security in our security network.

Our latest wakeup call came in the form of a Georgia lawyer known to have a serious form of tuberculosis who was able to take commercial flights to and around Europe, and back across the Atlantic, then drive across the border from Montreal, eluding authorities much of the way. What makes this case so unsettling is that health officials had no trouble determining his whereabouts and tracking him down, but still couldn't prevent him from acting irresponsibly and potentially exposing scores of passengers and crew members to TB.

There is some question over whether health department officials in Atlanta explicitly told Andrew Speaker not to fly abroad after he was diagnosed. They say they did, two days before he left for Paris with his wife on their honeymoon. He said they told him they "preferred" he not go, without recommending he take any special precautions. But there is no doubt that after determining he had XDR TB, a much more dangerous form of the disease than was originally diagnosed, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reached him on his cell phone in Rome and instructed him not to fly on a commercial plane. He did just that, leaving his hotel before he could be taken out of circulation and plans could be made to transport him to a treatment facility in the United States. By the time the agency got around to putting his name on a no-fly list, he had landed in Montreal. No one is saying how he was able to get through customs, without his name popping up on a computer screen, and drive into this country.

A big "What If?" pops out at us like a menacing jack-in-the-box. What if the man in question was not a traveler with a bad attitude but a terrorist on a mission to spread disease or start a SARS-like scare? How easy or difficult would it be for him, or her, to evade authorities?

Though officials set out to track down everyone who was aboard the same flights as the infected man, a task made difficult by the time it took to retrieve passenger manifests from airlines, they say the risk of infection was low. The man's wife was not infected. It will be a while, though, before the risk posed by faulty security can be downplayed. Six years after 9/11, there's still an alarming amount of work to do.

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