Florida Gov. Rick Scott accidentally gives out phone-sex number

The hot line phone number was indeed hot – it was a phone sex line.

The phone number given out earlier this week by Florida Gov. Rick Scott was supposed to be that of the state’s information hot line for a deadly meningitis outbreak. But Scott was one digit off, briefly providing the state’s residents an opportunity to hear the low purr of a woman’s voice offering to talk dirty.

[Updated, Oct. 11, 8:52 a.m. Scott was informed of his error about 30 minutes later, his spokeswoman told the Los Angeles Times after this post was first published. The correct number was provided, and the phone-sex line was presumably returned to its usual paying customers.

But, pointed out spokeswoman Jackie Schutz: “The correct number was available for days” on the governor’s website and elsewhere.]

Scott was providing an update on the meningitis outbreak at a Cabinet meeting Tuesday when he misread one of the hot line digits. Twelve people in 10 states have died of fungal meningitis, including one in Florida, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A Florida public radio station, WUSF in Tampa, was monitoring the Cabinet meeting live and posted the sex line number on its website.

An alert listener called the station to report that the phone number was actually for an adult content hot line, the station reported on its website.

“Hello, boys, thank you for calling me on my birthday,’’ a woman’s recorded voice answered on the sex line, the station said. The woman directed “existing callers’’ to press one for more.

The station said it quickly informed the governor’s office, and Scott gave out the correct number during the same Cabinet meeting.

A recorded message on the governor’s press office line said it was experiencing “a high volume of calls.’’

For the record, the correct toll-free number for the Florida Fungal Meningitis Hotline is 866-523-7339.

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david.zucchino@latimes.com