Implement health screening ahead of flights

Currently, many airports conduct temperature checks on arriving passengers, but this may already be too late, as passengers might have been infected on the plane but do not show symptoms yet when they land.

Airports in Singapore and around the world should conduct health checks before passengers board the plane ("Should sick passengers be allowed to fly?" by Ms Angela Xu Huifang; yesterday).

In 2003, the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) virus was imported into Singapore by a passenger flying back from Hong Kong.

The virus killed 33 people here.

At the time, Sars was a new illness that the world had to grapple with.

We should not wait for another Sars-like crisis before we take action to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, especially since more people are travelling all over the world more frequently these days.

Ace Kindredzen Cheong
China

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on October 30, 2015, with the headline Implement health screening ahead of flights. Subscribe