jaymar01

With the Ebola Crisis in the Background, Standards for Disinfecting Planes Vary Based on Time, Class. Just how clean are airplanes? Do they really get scrubbed down after each flight?

http://online.wsj.com/articles/the-t...ean-1410993651

CL87

In contrast, I usually clean up my seat after the flight. I straighten all the magazines and inserts in the seat pocket and put the seat belt nicely. When I get a hot towel, after using it on my hands, I wipe the armrests and tray table. If leather seats, I wipe parts of the seat.

FLgrr

If you left restaurant cleaning up to the establishment, we would all have food poisoning regularly. The airlines only care about cost, only make money when the aircraft flies. They don't need to go near Ebola to make people sick. Flu season in the US, just be near people, and you can get sick. You can't just clean up after the BIG stuff. You have to clean and disinfect all the time!

PLeblond

Sounds to me like the press feeding on peoples' unfounded fears. Wanting to create a stir

According to the CDC,: "The virus is spread through direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes) with

a sick person's blood or body fluids (urine, saliva, feces, vomit, and semen)
objects (such as needles) that have been contaminated with infected body fluids"

That says direct contact AND contact with broken skin/mucous membranes.

The virus cannot live outside the body very long, especially with the very dry environment on an airplane.

Edit: Also from the CDC specific guidance for airlines re Ebola: "The risk of spreading Ebola to passengers or crew on an aircraft is low because Ebola spreads by direct contact with infected body fluids. Ebola does NOT spread through the air like flu." (http://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/air/ma...-airlines.html)

Basically: "Even if the person has been in a country with Ebola, cabin crew won’t know for certain what type of illness a sick traveler has. Therefore, cabin crew should follow routine infection control precautions for all travelers who become sick during flight, including managing travelers with respiratory illness to reduce the number of droplets released into the air. If in-flight cleaning is needed, cabin crew should follow routine airline procedures using personal protective equipment available in the Universal Precautions Kit." - So airlines do not have a specific procedure for Ebola. Its the same procedure they would use for any sick passenger.

fastfxr

Wow...what an effective way of ensuring your germs are on EVERY surface.

FLgrr

Great education. Thanks

24left

We all know many airlines no longer want to spend the money to sanitize aircraft cabins. While none of us can really prevent flying with people who have no understanding of how to dispose of their garbage on a plane (or how to behave - see Passenger Shaming thread), we can make our own spot a little less offensive.

I have been using Clorox/Lysol wipes for the last 3 years. It may not prevent anything, but I feel better when I place my devices, food or drink on a clean table. I also wipe the seat belt buckles, the IFE screen and remote, the armrests and the head rest - which once left black residue on the wipe. (On a flight in December, pax near me took their dog out of its carrier and placed it on the tray table next to their food. Think about who might have had that seat on the next flight)

Although costly and it may not be interpreted properly by pax, it would be great if airlines could have one of those containers of wipes you see at the front door of grocery and big-box stores to wipe the handles of the cart before use.

PLeblond

When exactly have airlines sanitized aircraft cabins?

Purim

LMAO

Transpacificflyer

Your comment in respect to the dog is unnecessary concern. The bacteria associated with dogs for the most part, is harmless to humans. Nor are canine viruses usually infectious in humans. When's the last time a human contracted canine distemper or canine influenza? Our bodies are covered in bacteria and if I took a swab of your nostril, I could culture some rather scary beasties.
If you are truly concerned about exposure, worry more about those lavatory doors and faucets. Tell the guy who peed all over the toilet and floor to clean up his mess. (I don't know why it is that so many men are unable to aim for the toilet bowl.) Avoid children as they are most likely to be carrying something and to be coated with beasties, especially feces residue. Kids don't have the best hygiene and are prone to picking their orifices and then touching things. It's not just kids. Too many passengers will not wash their hands, or have a habit of sneezing/coughing and not covering their mouths. The beasties spread by humans with GI infections are robust and can live for many hours, even days on surfaces. This is why cruise lines face high risks of the spread of norvirus.

In respect to your wiping down of surfaces, I too wipe down surfaces, especially my touch screen and my control pad. I also try to minimize my traveling during peak flu season.

24left

Thanks for the reminder about children and grown men. I can't do much about any of the behaviors you describe.
I am thankful that I have yet to see the "dirty diapers on the floor or seat pocket and potty training in the aisle mid-flight" kind of show.

I am also aware that dog bacteria is not the worst thing. It was more the sight of it all that drove us nuts.
As for pax not washing their hands, well then maybe Purell is a better idea than wipes.

For my 8:30 am flight to LAX tomorrow, I have my Clorox travel pack, if for no other reason than to see how many people ask me for a wipe.

AlohafromKOA

Thank you, 24Left. I have traveled for years with sanitizing and antibacterial wipes and hand them out liberally to those around me, despite the looks I get from less germ phobic travelers. The things I have witnessed personally have shown that we cannot depend on the airline crews to properly sanitize. Sat across the aisle from a man in F who picked his nose the entire 5 hr flight and wiped it on his seat.... (I asked the attendant to offer him a Kleenex to which he declined) And yes, I'll freely admit that I used to giggle about travelers with face masks, but no more! People sneezing without covering their mouths. Eww.

Airlines need to have containers of wipes at the front or pass through the cabin BEFORE the service and pass out wipes so people can be reminded that we stopped walking on knuckles long ago.

Its an icky world out there and now its all squeezed into that big metal tube hurtling through space. Ewww and ewwww!

OverThereTooMuch

Pets ON THE TRAY TABLE are ok, but kids are not?! Dogs eat their own turds, and are more likely than most children to have one dangling out of their bottom or have stepped in one and have it smeared on their feet.

I'd look at a person putting a dog on a tray table the same way I'd look at a person changing a diaper on a tray table.

Pendulum effect.

Marilu

That's a great idea. Walmart has that. Certainly Delta w/ its record profits can make that available.

Eastbay1K

I clearly recall that in 1982 or 3 when I flew on a World Airways DC10 from LAX to OAK to visit a friend who just started at Cal, that my seat had rice on it. No, not wedding rice. Rice from what was likely the meal on the previous segment.

I have not had any confidence in airline cleanliness since, and knew that planes weren't really cleaned between flights. It is nothing new.