The history of one flight outlines the risk

(HealthDay) —Sure how safe it is to fly during the pandemic?

The story of one international flight in March – before the advent of mask and glove protocols – suggests that even with infected passengers on board, the chances of catching COVID-19 are relatively small.

Report August 18 in the journal JAMA Network open, German researchers tell the health results for 102 passengers who were on board a Boeing 737 in Tel Aviv, Israel, on March 9 and land in Frankfurt, Germany, 4 hours 40 minutes later.

This was before the advent of strict hygiene protocols – mandatory masks on passengers and crew, discouragement of meetings in the corridors, restriction of food on board – that airlines have since made their place to restrict the transmission of SARS-CoV-2.

Among the 102 passengers: A tour group of 24 people who had contact with a hotel manager a week earlier, who was later confirmed to have COVID-19. Upon landing in Frankfurt, all passengers in the tour group underwent throat wet tests to help detect a coronavirus infection.

Tests were positive for seven of the 24 people in the tour group.

So, did one of the other passengers on the plane catch COVID-19 from those seven infected passengers?

Based on follow-up interviews with 71 of the remaining 78 passengers, including coronavirus tests of 25 more, “we detected two probable SARS-CoV-2 transmissions on this flight,” the researchers reported. The research team was led by Dr. Sandra Ciesek, from the Institute of Medical Virology at the Goethe University in Frankfurt.

The two additional cases occurred in passengers sitting within two rows of one of the infected passengers from the tour group, the Ciesek group notes.

The researchers also stress that because tests of the 71 passengers occurred up to nine weeks after the flight, infections in the two new cases may still be “before or after the flight.”

For infectious disease expert Dr Amesh Adalja, the report is good news for people who feel they need to fly in the near future.

“I think it is noteworthy that in seven index cases, only two possible cases of COVID-19 transmission occurred on a flight of a period of more than four hours with no restriction measures in place,” Adalja said. He is a senior scientist at the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.

The Ciesek group agreed, noting that the ceiling-to-floor airflow could have helped prevent widespread infection on board, and “it could be speculated that the fare could be further reduced if the passengers wore masks.”

The advent of mask mandates in flight and other precautionary measures were essential to make flight safer, Adalja thinks.

“For me, flying is an activity that was made relatively less risky during the pandemic,” he said. However, he added, “passengers should maintain social distance, avoid compound areas, wash their hands, remember to touch their face and wear face mask as indicated.”

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