Hygiene: Can I request not to take my shoes off?
Jul 28, 2007, 3:00 pm
#46
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I agree that this is a highly disgusting behaviour we're being demanded to follow. So, my question is: Why doesn't the Health Department get involved?? Certainly people from there also travel and have to go through the shoe carnival - how can they not see what we see and do something about it?
DD
DD
Jul 28, 2007, 5:58 pm
#47
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Health Department does not get involved because national security/Shoe Carnival trumps public health and basic hygiene. I called CDC one day and asked about its position on walking around airports without shoes. The woman who took my call basically told me to bug off. TSA practices (shoe carnival, screeners rummaging through luggage and bags without changing gloves) are far more likely to spread disease than to stop terrorists.
^ For your efforts
For their response
Jul 28, 2007, 7:33 pm
#48
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Last month saw a lady in LAX while TSA insisted her to took off her sandal & broke her pretty long painted red toe nails, she asked TSA for the compensation of fixing her toe nails, don't know the outcome as I was rushing to the gate to catch my flight...
Jul 28, 2007, 7:34 pm
#49
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Can you provide any data whatsoever to support that assertion? Even one proven case of some disease being caught from a TSA screener's gloves?
Jul 28, 2007, 9:24 pm
#51
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Common knowledge that many germs and diseases are spread by contact. I have searched but have not found any articles or reports.
Any data that TSA has intercepted shoe bombs? Even one proven case of TSA stopping a shoe bomber on a flight originating in the United States?
Jul 28, 2007, 10:53 pm
#52
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If there was even a remote possibility of Kippies minions finding a shoe bomb, it would have been all over the news for weeks. The silence speaks for itself.
Jul 28, 2007, 11:50 pm
#53
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Common knowledge that many germs and diseases are spread by contact. I have searched but have not found any articles or reports.
Any data that TSA has intercepted shoe bombs? Even one proven case of TSA stopping a shoe bomber on a flight originating in the United States?
Any data that TSA has intercepted shoe bombs? Even one proven case of TSA stopping a shoe bomber on a flight originating in the United States?
Jul 29, 2007, 12:50 am
#54
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My point entirely - so why are you worried about one unproven and probably infinitessimally negligible risk (if people were catching diseases from screening surely it would be all over the newspapers?), but not another (assuming you subscribe the the "the TSA is a complete waste of money" view)?
Read post #19 in this thread for the appreciable risks of the Shoe Carnival. Blood on the floor was enough of a concern to shut down a checkpoint line so the floor could be cleaned. The risk of passengers contracting a disease or adverse medical condition such as athlete's foot is far greater than the benefit of TSA trying to prevent a terrorist attack by forcing all passengers to remove their shoes.
Moreover, think about the signs in restrooms admonishing employees to wash hands after using the facilities. I suppose that germs magically disappear at TSA checkpoints. Imagine this scenario: TSA screener paws all through dirty laundry of passenger immediately before he paws through your bags. Would you want TSA screener to change gloves? The same principle applies to walking on a filthy airport floor.
Again, I submit that the risk of cross-contamination and passengers becoming ill is far higher than is the possibility that TSA will foil a shoe bombing.
Jul 29, 2007, 6:02 am
#56
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Opinion of an infectious disease specialist
Read this - the entire thread - if you're still skeptical:
http://flyertalk.com/forum/showthrea...ctious+disease
As did PatrickHenry, I had called the CDC, but got a much more sympathetic reception. The person I spoke with told me that he agreed that an airport check-point floor is ripe for transmitting infection, especially to certain susceptible individuals. However, he basically said the CDC wasn't going to touch this one with a ten foot pole.
http://flyertalk.com/forum/showthrea...ctious+disease
As did PatrickHenry, I had called the CDC, but got a much more sympathetic reception. The person I spoke with told me that he agreed that an airport check-point floor is ripe for transmitting infection, especially to certain susceptible individuals. However, he basically said the CDC wasn't going to touch this one with a ten foot pole.
Jul 29, 2007, 10:32 am
#57
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Read post #19 in this thread for the appreciable risks of the Shoe Carnival. Blood on the floor was enough of a concern to shut down a checkpoint line so the floor could be cleaned. The risk of passengers contracting a disease or adverse medical condition such as athlete's foot is far greater than the benefit of TSA trying to prevent a terrorist attack by forcing all passengers to remove their shoes.
Moreover, think about the signs in restrooms admonishing employees to wash hands after using the facilities. I suppose that germs magically disappear at TSA checkpoints. Imagine this scenario: TSA screener paws all through dirty laundry of passenger immediately before he paws through your bags. Would you want TSA screener to change gloves? The same principle applies to walking on a filthy airport floor.
Again, I submit that the risk of cross-contamination and passengers becoming ill is far higher than is the possibility that TSA will foil a shoe bombing.
Moreover, think about the signs in restrooms admonishing employees to wash hands after using the facilities. I suppose that germs magically disappear at TSA checkpoints. Imagine this scenario: TSA screener paws all through dirty laundry of passenger immediately before he paws through your bags. Would you want TSA screener to change gloves? The same principle applies to walking on a filthy airport floor.
Again, I submit that the risk of cross-contamination and passengers becoming ill is far higher than is the possibility that TSA will foil a shoe bombing.
Jul 29, 2007, 12:42 pm
#58
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TSA's failure to consider other factors, such as public health and consequences of the Shoe Carnival, is one of its major problems. Failing to do a cost/benefit analysis is risk avoidance rather than risk management. Cold but true.
Jul 29, 2007, 8:28 pm
#59
Join Date: Dec 2006
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Again your all worried about 10-15 seconds of walking on the floor than other parts of travelling. If food can stay on the floor for up to 45 seconds without contracting any germs, I'm sure 15 seconds is harmless for the majority. There are probably times where we have walked bare foot outside or wherever that would be just as, if not more 'germy' than an airport floor.
Jul 29, 2007, 8:34 pm
#60
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Moreover, think about the signs in restrooms admonishing employees to wash hands after using the facilities. I suppose that germs magically disappear at TSA checkpoints. Imagine this scenario: TSA screener paws all through dirty laundry of passenger immediately before he paws through your bags. Would you want TSA screener to change gloves? The same principle applies to walking on a filthy airport floor.
He touches his unit, then touches other people's belongings. Diseases or not, it's disgusting.
Super