Abstract

VALDERRAMA, Carolina  and  ALVAREZ, Carlos Arturo. Infectious diseases transmission during air travel: from myth to reality. Infect. [online]. 2009, vol.13, n.3, pp.203-216. ISSN 0123-9392.

Air transport could disseminate infectious diseases in a few hours around the world. Although it is considered one of the safest means of transportation, little is known about its public health safety impact, keeping in mind that it is expanding and increasing the amount of users who can acquire and spread these diseases. The critical point to avoid a pandemic outbreak is to foresee and to be prepared; this could be done with health and aviation personnel training. Thus, this paper shows a general background about the aeronautical impact on infectious diseases transmission and all strategies created to get an early activation of epidemiological alarms to control any outbreak. They include from health, flight staff and passenger education on ground to prevention, prophylaxis, early disease identification as well as both immediate and retrospective post-flight event management.

Keywords : travel; emporiatric medicine; aircraft; infectious disease; disease outbreak; public health; cabin; airplane; aerospace medicine; communicable disease.

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