TB-infected talks by phone to senators

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The 31-year-old lawyer infected with a rare, often fatal form of tuberculosis told a Senate subcommittee Wednesday that he was never told prior to his flight last month to Europe for his wedding that he was contagious, but a health official said he was warned not to travel.
“I’ve cooperated with anything anyone has asked me to do,” Andrew Speaker told the Committee on Appropriations’ Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies.
Talking by telephone from his isolation room at National Jewish Medical and Research Center in Denver, Speaker said he decided to leave the country after discussing his plans to get married in Greece with officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Fulton County Department of Health and Wellness and his future father-in-law, who is a microbiologist at the CDC involved in tuberculosis research.
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