Nearly 10,000 passengers tested negative before flying — here’s how many infections slipped through

A study conducted earlier this year shows there may be a way to reduce the number of Covid infections on board commercial airplanes to virtually zero. Results of the study appeared in a peer-reviewed article published on Sept. 1 in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings medical journal. The article — a joint effort by Mayo Clinic, the Georgia Department of Public Health and Delta — showed that that one PCR test performed within 72 hours of flying decreased the rate of infected travelers onboard to 0.05%. That’s five people for every 10,000 passengers. At the time of the study, the rate of infection in the US was 1.1% — or about 1 in every 100 people. The findings analyzed data from Delta’s preflight testing program which ran from December 2020 to May 2021. Here’s how Delta’s testing program worked: Passengers on select flights from New York City and Atlanta could fly to Italy, without having to quarantine upon arriving, if they tested negative for Covid-19 via a PCR test within 72 hours before the flight, a rapid antigen test prior to departure, and a rapid antigen test upon landing. Of the 9,853 people who tested negative via the PCR test, four tested positive at the airport via rapid antigen tests. The diagnoses were confirmed via a rapid molecular test, and these people were not allowed to fly. Of the passengers who flew to Italy, one tested positive upon landing. This translates to one case detection per 1,970 travelers “during a time of high prevalence of active infection in the United States,” according to the article. “That’s a pretty darn low number,” said Dr. Aaron J. Tande, the lead author of the article and an infectious disease specialist at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Story has more.<br/>