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TSA's mm-Wave Body Scanner Breaks Diabetic Teen's $10K Insulin Pump
OverTheGeicoE writes "Savannah Barry, a Colorado teenager, was returning home from a conference in Salt Lake City. She is a diabetic and wears an insulin pump to control her insulin levels 24/7. She carries documentation of her condition to assist screeners, who usually give her a pat-down search. This time the screeners listened to her story, read her doctor's letter, and forced her to go through a millimeter-wave body scanner anyway. The insulin pump stopped working correctly, and of course, she was subjected to an invasive manual search. 'My life is pretty much in their hands when I go through a body scan with my insulin pump on,' she says. She wants TSA screeners to have more training. Was this a predictable outcome, considering that no one outside TSA has access to millimeter-wave scanners for testing? Would oversight from the FDA or FCC prevent similar incidents from happening in the future?"
... to just dump them thar thugs and kill off the TSA. Or the other way around if you must, I don't care.
From reading the article (I know, what's wrong with me), it seems like she is a brainless sheep that does whatever someone tells her to. I don't go through the scanners and I don't even have an expensive medical device that doctors told me not to send though the scanners. Why would she listen to the rape-monkeys rather than her doctor is beyond me. The world would be better off if the TSA were disbanded and every employee beheaded. Of course the human race would be better off if she had died right on the spot also, we don't need more idiotic followers like her.
-- ssoorrrryy,, dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh oonn.. -Quote found on actual fortune cookie.
If the insulin pump is that easy to break, surely some blame lies there as well?
We are talking about something that should be required to withstand basically a lot of punishment, because the owners life depends on it - if subjecting it to a small amount of radiation (and no matter how the TSA likes to get piled on here, their scanners do emit a small amount of radiation in the scheme of things) in the course of a pretty routine activity, then the pumps manufacturer needs to look to resolving that flaw with their equipment.
I fly weekly with a pump and have for over 10 years. I've never had any problems with the pump or met a TSA person who didn't "get" it. Also, she's getting more radiation on the plane itself than from anything on the ground. Plus, the new scanners are the best thing to happen to pump people. They are microwaves, not Xrays and they make the process super fast. I hold the pump in my hand, show it to them, walk through, no problem. I suspect this young lady may have had some bad luck, a little confusion on everyone's part and a little paranoia.
(taken from TFAs comment page)
Wait... that can't be right. I thought everything bad was caused by the government and everything good was caused by free market forces.