AWKWARD: Woman asked to prove she wasn’t pregnant before boarding plane

Test de embarazo

An airline has landed itself in hot water for asking a passenger to take a pregnancy test to prove she wasn’t pregnant.

And if this isn’t the most awkward thing you read about today, please email your response to thatsnotpossible@thisisthemostawkwardthing.com.

Japanese citizen Midori Nishida was travelling from Hong Kong to Saipan, a US island in the Pacific, to visit her parents when staff asked her to undertake a “fit-to-fly” assessment, according to The Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

Despite Nishida ticking the ‘not pregnant’ box on a check-in questionnaire, airline staff working for Hong Kong Express were not convinced and handed her a permission form for the assessment, which said it was for women who appeared to have a “body size and shape resembling a pregnant woman”.

Nishida was then escorted to a bathroom and handed a pregnancy test. Understandably, she told WSJ that she found the experience “humiliating and frustrating”.

Hong Kong Express has since apologised and said it would immediately suspend the practice while reviewing it.

“In response to concerns raised by authorities in Saipan, we took actions on flights to Saipan from February 2019 to help ensure U.S. immigration laws were not being undermined,” the airline said.

The immigration laws the airline refers to are in regards to a boom in women giving birth in Saipan to make their babies eligible for US citizenship.

Though it isn’t illegal for pregnant foreigners to enter the US, or from giving birth there, it is legal for immigration officials to bar visitors who have lied about their purpose of travel, or if they plan to undertake a medical procedure but don’t have the money to pay for it.

It was also reported that more foreigners gave birth in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, which Saipan is part of, than residents in 2018.

Travel Weekly has contacted Hong Kong Express for comment.

Featured image: (iStock.com/paolaroid)

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