WASHINGTON — Imagine finding out you were on the flight with a person known to have a deadly virus?
That’s what happened to a Columbia, Maryland, man.
When Dennis Brown’s wife told him he flew from Brussels to Washington D.C. on the same day as the man who tested positive for the Ebola virus, he brushed it off.
“It’s a large airport. There’s lots of international travelers going through it. The chance of him and myself being on the same plane were probably pretty slim,” he told her.
And that was the end of it, right up until she heard the flight number on the news.
“She came out and said ‘That was your flight,'” he said. “Sure enough. it was my flight, 951. As luck would have it, we were on the same plane.”
So what was his initial reaction?
“Concern, of course,” he said. “But all the reports say that without physical contact, it’s not spread.”
He also thought of the people who were near him on that flight.
“When I was standing in line waiting to board, I was standing behind folks who had just traveled up from Africa,” he recalled. “I went out and searched the internet and found a photograph of the patient in Dallas and realized it wasn’t the folks that were standing in line in front of me, so I felt a whole lot better.”
He also talked to his doctor who reassured him that he was most likely safe from the virus since it’s transmitted through bodily fluids.
Brown, who flies frequently, says even knowing he was on the same flight as the man who has the Ebola virus does not have him concerned about getting such an illness when flying, but he does take precautions.
“I make it a point not to touch handrails or use common areas,” he said.
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