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Source: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-airport24-2008nov24,0,3768888.story
Illness scare delays jet passengers at LAX
A man's case of food poisoning holds up more than 300 patrons as paramedics and CDC officials rule out contagious disease.
By Ari B. Bloomekatz
11:15 AM PST, November 23, 2008
Passengers of a jumbo jet that arrived from Japan today were held on board at Los Angeles International Airport for a short time while paramedics determined that a passenger had food poisoning rather than a contagious illness.
United Airlines flight 890 informed ground crews shortly before touching down at 8:30 a.m. that a 28-year-old man aboard the aircraft of more than 300 passengers was sick and might have some sort of virus, said Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Cecil Manresa.
Los Angeles city paramedics and personnel from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention boarded the Boeing 747 after it landed. It took about 20 minutes to determine that the passenger was not contagious, Manresa said.
"He had some kind of stomach ailment or food poising issue, and it was not a virus [or] an infectious disease," he said.
Manresa said that city paramedics, and not the CDC, generally respond when airline passengers complain of illness. But the unidentified man must have told the airplane's crew something to make them think that his condition was more severe, he said.
Bloomekatz is a Times staff writer.
Illness scare delays jet passengers at LAX
A man's case of food poisoning holds up more than 300 patrons as paramedics and CDC officials rule out contagious disease.
By Ari B. Bloomekatz
11:15 AM PST, November 23, 2008
Passengers of a jumbo jet that arrived from Japan today were held on board at Los Angeles International Airport for a short time while paramedics determined that a passenger had food poisoning rather than a contagious illness.
United Airlines flight 890 informed ground crews shortly before touching down at 8:30 a.m. that a 28-year-old man aboard the aircraft of more than 300 passengers was sick and might have some sort of virus, said Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Cecil Manresa.
Los Angeles city paramedics and personnel from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention boarded the Boeing 747 after it landed. It took about 20 minutes to determine that the passenger was not contagious, Manresa said.
"He had some kind of stomach ailment or food poising issue, and it was not a virus [or] an infectious disease," he said.
Manresa said that city paramedics, and not the CDC, generally respond when airline passengers complain of illness. But the unidentified man must have told the airplane's crew something to make them think that his condition was more severe, he said.
Bloomekatz is a Times staff writer.