ACTE Cites Tuberculosis Case To Boost PNR Access For Health Agencies

The Association of Corporate Travel Executives, reacting to last week's highly publicized international air travel tuberculosis case, called for government health agencies to be allowed access to airline passenger name records. Security consultants, however, said access to manifests would have minimal affect on the ability of corporations to identify exposed travelers.

"There needs to be a reliable process in place permitting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, plus the World Health Organization, to quickly identify and locate passengers who may have been exposed to a contagious disease," said ACTE executive director Susan Gurley. There is no federal requirement for airlines to produce manifests to the CDC or other government agencies, according to Gurley.

Most corporations already have plans to learn of exposure levels and track down possibly exposed travelers in less than 10 minutes. "In this area, most corporations have this nailed," said Bruce McIndoe, CEO of Annapolis, Md.-based IJet Intelligent Risk Systems. "The companies are heeding to the changing world dynamics and they are even out ahead of the government on an issue as important as this."

Delivering passenger manifests becomes an even murkier proposition when dealing with international flights and the varying privacy laws of the European Union and the United States, said Tim Daniel, COO of Trevose, Penn.-based International SOS. "It gets very complicated when you look at it in a transnational setting," he said. "This is another example—one you'd think is clear-cut and isn't."