Curiouser and curiouser

My previous post on the Andrew Speaker matter centered around the AP's poorly-written initial story and how the questions it raised almost exceeded the information it conveyed. Two days later, more information is coming out, and it appears there are plenty of screwups to go around. It may take a Congressional investigation (horrors!) to sort things out. Here's a rough guide to the issues:

• What was Speaker told before he left? Speaker says health officials "discouraged" him from making the trip, but when asked point-blank if he was a risk and if they were forbidding his trip they said no. Wayne County (Georgia) health officials say they told Speaker not to make the trip. Speaker says he has a tape of the conversation. ("Steve Katkowsky of the Fulton County Health Department told CNN, 'If such a recording was made it was without the consent and without the knowledge of Fulton County Health Department officials.'"-- CNN Story, June 2, 9:25am) Um-hum, could be a gotcha. Let's see if there's any more mention of the tape.
  
• What was Speaker told by the CDC? In his Good Morning America interview, Speaker said he was told not to take a commercial flight home, and instead to check in to a clinic in Rome. This, he says, left him facing "a very real threat that [he] could have died" in Italy, since he had been told earlier that the only place he could be treated was in Denver.
  
• Did the government offer Speaker any assistance at getting home? Government says yes, Speaker says "that's a lie."

If Speaker's story holds up, it appears that U.S. authorities (that is, the CDC and the Fulton County Health Department) had second thoughts after they had allowed Speaker to leave the country. They contacted him, told him not to take a commercial flight back, but offered no practical assistance for his situation, their only suggestion being (to him) the equivalent of a death sentence. In fact, all they did was put Speaker on the "no fly" list (which had the consequence of exposing more people than if he's just flown directly back to the states), and flagged his passport. The results we all know.

My initial question ("What the hell were they supposed to do? Send him back to Canada?) seems to have been resolved: According to later reports, Speaker was supposed to be "detained and isolated, and public health officials [were to] be contacted" [CNN Report], not blocked from entering the country [gist of the AP report quoted in my post]. So I guess we're fortunate that American citizens still can't be barred from their country simply on the say-so of some bureaucrat.

Posted by: Old Grouch in In Passing at 03:51:47 GMT | No Comments | Add Comment
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