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Planning and Response to Communicable Disease on US Domestic Air Flights

David J Dausey, Paul A Biedrzycki, Thomas Cook, James Teufel, Matthew Vendeville and Emily Francis

Globalization along with the ongoing spread of novel infectious diseases including influenza, coronavirus, and Ebola has spurred growing interest and significant research on the impact of commercial air travel as a factor contributing to the spread of disease from one geographic location to another. Despite this, there has been little to no research on the appropriate response to this public health challenge and the coordination of response capabilities across key responders. We conducted a tabletop exercise to explore a scenario that simulated a U.S. domestic commercial flight transporting a passenger infected with probable MERS-CoV. Participants included a broad range of stakeholders in a medium-sized Mid-western U.S. city. The tabletop exercise revealed gaps in public health preparedness among response partners that require improved collaboration among public health, airport operations and airline personnel, and fire and emergency management services.