Full Body Scanners and Prostheses
Posted 11/20/2010
Posted in
Just as you suspected, it is true that the new full body scanners in use at some airports do pick up breast prostheses. What happens next is the story of this entry. There has been a fair amount of public complaint, exclusive of any breast cancer issues, about these scanners. Most of us, including me, have decided that the importance of security outweighs my misgivings, and I believe them when they say that the screens are in a separate building, so that no one present sees the stripped down x-ray. That is, the people who are near you and see you do not see the x-ray of your body.
I have been through these scanners several times at Boston's Logan Airport (where it seems to be random whether you are directed through the usual metal detector or one of the new full body scanners). Each time, yes indeed, it has picked up my breast prosthesis, and I have then received a personal pat down by a female TSA employee. Each time, the pat-down woman has been very kind and respectful, but it is infuriating. I have not found it humiliating, but I know that others do. My own current plan, depending on my mood at the moment, is to either whip out the prosthesis in full view of everyone and dump it in the box with my shoes (that is if I am feeling angry enough about this) or remove it earlier, put it in my purse that does through the machine, and then retrieve it on the far side of Security.
This is from MSNBC. I give you an excerpt and then the link and would really like to hear your comments. I mean it about the comments. I would be amazed if you don't have some kind of reaction to this one. Please share it.
By Suzanne Choney
msnbc.com
updated 5:31 p.m. ET Nov. 19, 2010
A longtime Charlotte, N.C., flight attendant and cancer survivor told a local television station that she was forced to show her prosthetic breast during a pat-down.
Cathy Bossi, who works for U.S. Airways, said she received the pat-down after declining to do the full-body scan because of radiation concerns.
The TSA screener "put her full hand on my breast and said, 'What is this?' " Bossi told the station. "And I said, 'It's my prosthesis because I've had breast cancer.' And she said, 'Well, you'll need to show me that.' "
http://tinyurl.com/2eh82tl
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