Originally Posted by
christep
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.