U.S. — The Transportation Security Administration announced this morning that it would be ending the practice of performing colonoscopies on travelers at airports around the country in an effort to speed up security lines amidst the ongoing partial government shutdown.
A TSA press release said that eliminating the standard colonoscopy portion of the search was a risk the agency was willing to take to accommodate travelers.
“Our checkpoints will now be slightly less invasive,” TSA spokesman Robert Clarence told reporters after the announcement. “Having to prep a traveler for such a procedure takes time, and sometimes we even had to forgo an anesthetic and go straight for the kill, so to speak. So, to prevent further delays, we decided to stop performing routine colonoscopies at airports. Hopefully, relaxing security a little won’t come back to bite us in the… well… we hope everything goes smoothly.”
Though the practice had long been a source of controversy for its intrusiveness, the TSA assured the public that the colonoscopies were important to maintain the highest levels of security.
“We’re going to retire these procedures to the annals of TSA history,” Clarence said. “They’ve been butting up against TSA efficiency goals for a while, so we decided to put them at the bottom of our priority list and start a whole new chapter in our protocols. We’re getting a little behind in wait times, so it was decided to make a change.”
At publishing time, the TSA announced that it would also stop requiring all passengers to fully undress and do the chicken dance before passing security checkpoints.
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