I entirely sympathise with the family here, a horrible situation that BA should have fixed within 24 hours and offered more than adequate immediate compensation for (They lost my bag last year and met me at the arrival gate to explain the situation and give me a pre-paid Visa card loaded with £100 per case).

However, the media should not be hyping it - the situation was bad but made much worse by the family checking the drugs, presumably not having insurance and only having £900 available for a 2 week holiday in the US - there are loads of other things that could have gone wrong in 2 weeks in Florida that meant only having £900 and no insurance is quite frankly ridiculous. It should be a 'live and learn' for next time and get as much comp from BA as possible - not a media story.