The passenger who cried lice

[MaggieTheCat]

My husband came home from a business trip today. He was in Baltimore and had one stop in Dallas on the way home. When he got to Dallas and was waiting to board his next flight, they called him up to the desk at his gate and told him that someone near him on his previous flight apparently had head lice, and they wanted him to go to the bathroom to check and make sure it didn't look like he had any. Nope, all good, just some dandruff.

So he gets on his second plane and when he's deboarding at our airport, they call him to the front desk again. This time, they tell him that the person he was sitting next to on the Baltimore > Dallas flight told a flight attendant that they saw head lice on my husband on the plane. Because of this, they had to decommission the plane and over 200 people had their flight delayed or canceled because of it. They were planning on decommissioning this plane, too, but asked my husband to be inspected by a paramedic first. My husband agreed.

It took over half an hour for the paramedic to show up, which caused that plane's next flight to be delayed, with around 80 people standing around waiting to find out what was going on (my husband commented that he hopes he never has a heart attack in our airport.) When the paramedic finally did show up, he took one look at my husband's head and said, "No lice, just dandruff."

Talk about crying wolf. My husband was pissed! I don't want to say the name of the airline company here, but my husband is going to tell his manager that he'll never fly with them again, business or not.

[LillFilly]

Well, I hope that A) the person who decided to travel with lice got a talking-to, and B) that they appologized to your husband! Gee, lice looks EXACTLY like dandruff!!! Exactly, as any normal person knows (end sarcasm)...

As seen here. Dandruff:
http://www.modernguidetohealth.com/w...-treatment.jpg

And Lice:
http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/...s_onscalp3.jpg

And, you know, LICE MOVES!!!

[bainsidhe]

Damn. I mean I understand erring on the side of caution, but good grief. What were they going to do if he'd refused to see a paramedic? For that matter, why decommission the previous plane if the earlier airline personnel thought everything looked fine. The Dallas folks had the right idea. They didn't embarrass hubby by pointing fingers and they suggested some privacy by going to a nearby restroom. Geez. I hope he sends a well-worded email to the higher-ups at that airline.

[MaggieTheCat]

He got a very generic "well, sorry for the inconvenience" kind of apology but nothing more. And yeah, I was pretty pissed when he said that they did this whole thing right in the lobby of our airport, where the 80-some passengers waiting to get on the plane were watching.

We're probably going to send them a letter or something. We're considering writing it through PFB, actually. If we do, though, should we make the complaint against the airport or the airline company?

Edit to add: If he hadn't waited for the paramedic in our airport, they would have decommissioned the plane he just got off of and caused the 80-some people to have their flight delayed/canceled. He said he really wanted to walk out of there because he didn't think they could legally detain him, but he didn't want to be a complete ass to those passengers waiting to get on the plane.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Long story, but I once went to work with a couple hundred green aphids in my hair.

Fun times.

The bad news is that your coworkers tend to freak the fuck out when you have hundreds of crawling bugs in your hair.

The good news is that aphids do not look anything like lice and are easy to brush out. Sticky, but not so much you can't get in there with a hairbrush and sweep them off.

[CarcinogenCrunchies]

Wow. I've heard plenty of stories about ludicrous flight regulations, but taking an entire plane out of service due to head lice is a new one for me. Were the lice carrying bombs, or more than the allowable quantity of shampoo?

[RecoveringKinkoid]

You know, I'm okay with that. I've never had lice and I'd like to keep it that way.

One of my best friends works with kids as an occupational therapist, and she'.s had lice several times. Not only is it hard to get rid of, but it's very pricey to get rid of, too. No thanks.

[Andara Bledin]

Well, I hope that A) the person who decided to travel with lice got a talking-to, and B) that they appologized to your husband! Gee, lice looks EXACTLY like dandruff!!! Exactly, as any normal person knows (end sarcasm)...

Just a note, but nobody really ever sees the lice themselves. Nits on pale hair look dark brownish, but nits on light hair look pale (larval lice are pale) whitish and are slightly obvious.

Even so, if it's flaky and falls out without being physically unglued from the hair shafts, it's not lice.

I had to deal with being de-loused nearly every week for about 5 months because some [expletive deleted] at my grade school kept bringing it back into the classroom. The school kept sending me home, inspecting me before they let me back in, then sending me home again a few days later. Then they sent CPS to the house, even though they already knew (since they'd freaking inspected me before I came back!) that I was getting it while at school.

Needless to say, my mother had some choice words for both the school and the idiot that CPS sent over. You'd think the person they sent to inspect for a lice infestation would be informed enough to know that you can't get lice from a cat.

Then again, my former mother-in-law was a nurse and she genuinely believed that you could get lice purely from not bathing enough. That she practices medicine scares me.

[edit to add]
Lice can be fairly easy to get rid of, if you are thorough about it. Most people just don't do all of the steps necessary, and that's why it won't go away. During the aforementioned school debacle, nobody else in my family ever got it. It was always only me. The shampoo treatments are nasty and a bit expensive, and they can do permanent damage to your scalp, too. But far worse than that is the sitting in place while someone pulls every single last nit out of your hair so that they can't hatch.

^-.-^

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I have heard (and I don't know if this is true) that they stick better to clean hair than to dirty hair. Any thoughts on this?

[Cats]

I have heard (and I don't know if this is true) that they stick better to clean hair than to dirty hair. Any thoughts on this?

I remember hearing something about that too several years ago, though I don't know from where. Something about them not liking oil or something (which is more likely to be found on dirty hair).

I had lice once, in the 4th grade, where there was an infestation going around. I don't remember if anyone got quarenteed from school as a result, but I do recall for a few weeks during that time the school nurse checking us pretty often, so at least the school was on top of it and keeping parents informed.

[Andara Bledin]

I have heard (and I don't know if this is true) that they stick better to clean hair than to dirty hair. Any thoughts on this?

I have no idea, but that wouldn't actually surprise me.

If your hair is dirty and has stuff coating it, then the glue they use to stick to the hair won't get as much direct contact.

I do know that one treatment option (if you want to avoid chemicals) is to wash your hair, leave it wet, apply conditioner, then use a lice/nit comb and have a partner/friend go through your entire head of hair, section by section, to remove any lice and nits. Do this pretty much every day/night for a week or two to make sure there isn't a re-infestation.

^-.-^

[Munkie]

When I was living with my mom, my step-dad and my two half-sisters, my half-sisters came home twice with lice. They were treated immediately, their bedrooms gone over, all toys went into the freezer, then the wash, and they pretty much got doused with Nix. After the first time, my mom had invested in a back-up supply and several nit combs. Good planning.

I've seen dead, full-grown lice. They're about half a centimeter long and brown. nasty things.

eta: talking about lice is making my head itch... ugh!

[calulu]

I could almost see the airlines point but think they went a little overboard. They handled it all wrong. Hard to believe they'd pull the plane out of commission because of a lice rumor.

About ten years ago I took a group of kids off to camp including a lil hellion I could not stand. Long story short I have to pick up both of my kids from camp with lice. Lil Hellion had been sent home the day before with lice, he was ground zero. Every kid that rode in my car ended up with lice, there were lice in my car and the hubby and I ended up getting it. Took a good month to get everyone lice free. An expensive stinky and burny mess.

[cinema guy]

I've heard that combing your hair three of four times a day helps prevent lice, since it breaks their legs and then they can't breed.

[BlaqueKatt]

I have heard (and I don't know if this is true) that they stick better to clean hair than to dirty hair. Any thoughts on this?

According to this-nope it's a myth

I've heard that combing your hair three of four times a day helps prevent lice, since it breaks their legs and then they can't breed.

um no-bugs are pretty resilient little things and look at your average hairbrush compared to the size of a louse-heck you need a comb to even dislodge them from your hair to see them-you'll almost never brush one out.