A woman experiencing an eczema flareup says airline personnel temporarily pulled from a plane because they wrongly suspected she had monkeypox.
Jacqueline Nguyen was with her wife when she boarded a Spirit Airlines flight to Los Angeles. She claims that almost immediately, a flight attendant asked her to speak with them.
“They just asked my wife and I to get off the plane and go to the jet bridge. And they were just like, ‘We want to know about that rash,’” Nguyen said.
But the rash wasn’t monkeypox. Nguyen has suffered from eczema, which causes dry and inflamed skin, for her whole life and was experiencing a flareup on the day of her flight.
“I just started crying, cause it was just so humiliating. I just felt ashamed, like it’s my skin. I wear it,” Nguyen said.
After the embarrassment of being marched off the plane, Nguyen says Spirit Airline officials asked her to provide proof of her eczema with medical documents from her doctor, which she didn’t have with her.
“We don’t carry around paperwork that’s like, ‘I have chronically dry skin,’” Nguyen said.
Michelle Henry, a dermatologist, says that people with all kinds of skin problems are being unfairly targeted in the wake of the monkeypox epidemic.
“There are so many judgments around our skin. So a lot of my patients are very concerned. They’re taking the subway. They’re concerned that someone’s going to take a photo of them. They’re concerned they’re going to be barred from a restaurant,”Henry said.
After Nguyen had produced her prescription for eczema cream, she was allowed to board the plane again.
“If you’re in a position of power, if you have the ability to take someone off of an airplane and stop them from seeing their families, you of all people should be educated,” Nguyen said.
Spirit Airlines didn’t respond to a request of comment.