HYDERABAD: Though the Union Health Ministry favours thermal scanners to screen passengers at all international airports in the country, officials at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA), Shamshabad, said Monday that they were happy using the less-expensive thermalflash thermometers.
“We are meticulously scanning all passengers using the thermal-flash infrared-enabled thermometers.
It’s a laborious process to screen each and every passenger, but is as effective as a thermal scanner,” Dr K N Reddy, Chief Medical Officer, RGIA, told Express.
While a thermal scanner costs Rs 10 lakh, a thermal-flash thermometer costs Rs 7,000.
Reddy said they had ordered five thermometers, being used at RGIA by the 25-odd medical staff deployed for the purpose. “If we have thermal scanners, human intervention will be less, but since it’s expensive, we decided to use thermometers,” he explained. The Union Health Ministry had issued an advisory in April this year asking all international airports to use thermal scanners.
However, most of the airports have been using temperature scanners and thermal-thermometers to screen passengers.
Interestingly, Mumbai international airport is the only airport of the six international airports in India, which uses a thermal scanner.
However, Airport Health Organisation officials said inappropriate usage and carelessness at the Mumbai airport led to the spread of H1N1 influenza.
A camera-based thermal scanner displays the body temperatures of all passengers on a monitor and is considered an effective tool worldwide to detect flu symptoms.