Acceptable Levels of Risk

Have you heard about this yahoo with TB who took a trans-Atlantic flight AGAINST his doc’s orders? He has a highly resistant form of TB, was told by his physicians not to travel in a commercial airliner due to his level of contagiousness. Well, he did anyway. Now, people from the plane are being tested and everyone’s fate is kinda up in the air. There are people on TV who are just blasting him left and right for his selfish decision to risk infecting innocent people.
When asked why he took the risk, he said that with his info, he didn’t think it was a problem. Hmmm, others sure did!
What is so irritating is the bigger picture here. People are all up in arms about his selfish choice…yet, on any given weekend night, an abnormally high number of drunks are driving down the same streets as you. Do people get up in arms? Hold press conferences? Nope. And that is a level of risk that almost every DWI driver will say was a risk theyy took-a limited risk. “I didn’t think I was unsafe to drive” or “I was only on back streets” or “I was the soberest person in our group.” Whatever. There is no excuse for either behavior. In fact, there is no excuse whatsoever for risking the safety and well being of any other human being. Period.