Holiday and Swine Flu

[LSainsbury]

From the FCO website:

( Link )

Egyptian authorities have introduced medical screening for the Swine Flu virus (H1N1) at several airports, including Cairo, Hurghada, Taba and Sharm El Sheikh for passengers arriving on international flights. This may change with no notice. You may be asked to undergo further tests if you show flu-like symptoms.

We are off to Egypt in a few weeks - say we flew into the airport, went through screening and they found one of us with cold / flu like symptoms, what would they do? Next plane home in isolation? Holiday ruined?

I've not spoken to the travel insurance company yet but I will be tomorrow just to be on the safe side...

Lee

[Raistlin]

They must be running some really quick tests, I would have thought it would take some time to get the results back to be sure whether you were clear or not.

I'm guessing you'll be quizzed at the airports about where you've come from, and where you've been recently - you'll probably also be asked about your general health.

I would imagine that unless you're showing symptoms (or unless you've been anywhere hi risk) you're unlikely to be singled out. I don't think they'd let you in though if they thought you were a carrier, or if you were likely to pose a threat. More likely they'd just do as you say and sling you on the next plane back, or perhaps even quarantine you in-country.

Definitely best to talk to your insurers Good luck, hope you get to go ok.

[Rob]

Given that Egypt was rather paranoid about swine flu using this as an excuse to cull the country's pigs, this step doesn't surprise me.

On the other hand given how vital tourism is to their economy, I doubt they'd want to do something that would heavily deter visitors. Strikes me as something that probably hasn't been that thought through. Remind you of our government?

[LSainsbury]

Thanks Rob - Ms LSainsbury is a bit paranoid that our holiday is going to be ruined before we step out of Luxor airport!

If they take our temperatures and find we are a few degrees over the limit we might be slung on the next plane home! But what would you expect - a nice A/c plane into the heat of Luxor airport - of course we might be a bit warm!

---------- Post added at 20:43 ---------- Previous post was at 20:32 ----------

And just found this

Rashid said that the Egyptian Company for Airports has completed the installation of thermal scanners at airports in Sharm El-Sheikh, Hurghada, Taba, Luxor, equipment itself is being installed at airports in Aswan, Luxor, Assiut, pointing out that the main reason for the delay in the dissemination of such devices on the Egyptian regional airports is the tremendous pressure exerted by airports Global companies producing these devices since the start of the announcement of the beginning of the epidemic.

He added that in the event that the temperature exceeded 37 degrees Celsius, the passenger is given a warning device either optically or audio on the observer, and to isolate the passenger and the signing of a medical examination by the hand and turned to the nearest hospital, admitted and put under observation,

[altis]

Given that a normal body's temperature exceeds 37 degrees for half the day then I can't see that working well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_temperature