MYRLN is a non-blogger who guest-blogs here on Mondays.

T.B.? So What? Revisited

Andrew Speaker’s the sociopathic tuberculosis carrier who decided what he wanted was more important than the possibility of spreading his disease by traveling. So he went on an international jaunt to get married.

So what’s new about that? This: it turns out that lawyer Speaker’s lawyer father — who insists he and his son weren’t told travel was inadvisable — was less than cooperative with or responsive to health officials even after the full extent of his son’s condition was known. The Centers for Disease Control called him to learn of the peripatetic Andrew’s whereabouts so they could get him back to the U.S. quickly and safely. Father Speaker’s response? “I can’t do that. I don’t know where he is. I appreciate your call.” And hung up.

Additionally, it turns out that Andrew’s new father-in-law, Robert Cooksey — who, ironically, works for the CDC — was asked to help stop the planned wedding in Greece. He not only declined to help, he went off to the wedding himself — obviously knowing by then the full extent of his new son-in-law-to-be’s condition.

And in a gesture that would make his daddy and daddy-in-law proud, Andrew has apologized for the scare and for putting dozens through the need for t.b. testing. How nice of him.

It’s a whole familyload of sociopaths who deserve both each other and some jail time. If only and as if.

And next month, Andrew Speaker will have surgery to remove lung tissue infected with the deadly, drug-resistant t.b. he carries. It’s a particular surgery in which — back in 1943 — a five-year old’s mother died on the operating table at Saranac Lake, New York. As despicable as Andrew Speaker is, one must wish him better luck in his surgery. If only for the good of those unfortunate enough to have contact with him afterwards.