Is it me or...

[bunn]

is this a bit horrible?

http://www.breastcancercare.org.uk/breast-cancer-breast-health/treatment-side-effects/surgery/breast-prostheses/uk-airport-body-scanners/

"The purpose of the scanners is to be able to identify concealed weapons and prohibited items, but they will also reveal external breast prostheses, the type worn after a mastectomy operation.

The Department for Transport advises people wearing an external breast prosthesis to notify security staff before being scanned.

Although this may be awkward or embarrassing, it will mean you are less likely to be searched than if you have not declared it. It may also be helpful for you to carry a letter from the GP or breast specialist, confirming your situation, to help ease transit through security.

Upon seeing the external prosthesis on the scan, it is an individual decision by the member of security staff as to whether they conduct a body search. This means that wearing a breast prosthesis does not inevitably lead to a body search, but may do so."

 Are prostheses REALLY such a major security threat that this undignified and unsavory approach is justified...?     Very dubious about the body scanning thing in general, but this is an extra level of intrusive ick!

Can't help thinking of the foil wrapped cucumber scene in Spinal Tap tho...

Comments

[bunn.livejournal.com]

The point is though, that at some point there is a decision 'OK, we can't reasonably check this'. Safety is not the only factor at play here: if it were, given that we've had bombs on buses and underground, we'd be scanning the people going onto those.

If someone flies a plane into a building, then OK, the risk involved there is particularly high, because it becomes a very large flying bomb.

But body scanners don't look for stuff that would help people fly into buildings, do they? They look for explosives that will cause the plane to fall out of the air in an uncontrolled manner, probably into the sea.

Even compared with a bomb on a large plane, a bomb in a busy station, or in the queue at Heathrow on the way in to the body scanners would probably do just as much damage, but we try not to worry aboutthat because it's just not feasible.

There comes a point when you have to accept 'if terrorists decide to do this, we can't stop them'. The only question then is where that point occurs, and I'm inclined to think that scanning for explosive breast prosthesis is beyond my personal tipping point.