How one passenger flying to China likely contracted Covid-19 midflight

The 44-year-old man was chatting with his wife and son on a flight from Singapore to China earlier this year when he let his guard down, allowing his face mask to slip below his nose. That lapse appears to have been how he became infected with Covid-19. The case, cited in a recently published study of an outbreak among passengers on a January flight, is one of the first to document a probable transmission on an airliner. Air travel presents unique risks for contracting the virus because conditions are so crowded. Research has shown airborne diseases such as Covid-19 can…