Noro outbreak on Caribbean princess

[jackson bernard]

They probably had some sick crew members clean the ship.

 

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[p010ne]

:eek: North Texas students also exhibiting the problem!:rolleyes:

[bunnycrawford]

I'm guessing that whatever DD had was not Noro. It was 12 hours of feeling really bad and 12 of feeling not right. More of a 24 hour bug.

 

Main point is that people might be sick when they board but not know it and that hand washing and sanitizing can help prevent the spread.

 

I was a preschool director for 10 years and the Health Department's rule was always 24 hours fever, vomiting and diarrhea free before returning to school.

[satxdiver]

It is so obvious that once you are on a cruise, you are contained and exposed. However, have you ever thought about an airplane? People walk down the center aisle and touch the top of every seatback. Then after the flight everyone gets off and a new group comes on board.

If you get the virus, you take it with you, as does everyone else so there is no containment. You just go home and are sick! Bon Voyage!

 

It is worse than that on an airplane. You are cramped together literally shoulder to shoulder and only a few inches behind the seats in front of you. Add to this the air is recirculated though the cabin the entire time the door is closed. Someone coughs, the germs are picked up in the air handling unit and recirculated all over the aircraft. It is a wonder more don't get sick from airplane trips particularly in the winter.

 

The norovirus which actually is a collection of different related virus types can also be spread in contaminated food. It takes 140F to kill the virus so any food that is not prepared over at least 140F for a period of time can be contaminated. At one time it was suggested that contaminated fish was brought onboard the RCCL ship with the other supplies and it infected all who ate or prepared it. I have not heard more on this possibility.

[Kenyon5]

 

They probably had some sick crew members clean the ship.

 

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:D:D:D Anne (sailing Feb. 22nd)

[azbirdmom]

I'm watching the local Phoenix Fox newscast and their lead off story featured a couple from Phoenix who were on the cruise last week. The passenger interviewed got sick on Tuesday night and was complaining about the medical bill and his distaste at getting a letter telling him that he couldn't disembark with the other passengers. Interesting how even the news stations far from Houston continue to sensationalize this story.

[caribill]

If this really was Noro your daughter had, according to CDC she is contagious for 2 to 3 DAYS after the last active event. That is why Princess and all other lines confine you to your cabins. 24 hours does not cut it.

 

Per the CDC web site, even two days is not enough:

"People with norovirus illness are contagious from the moment they begin feeling sick until at least 3 days after they recover. But, some people may be contagious for even longer."

 

But it is hard to confine someone to a cabin when the person is feeling A-OK for two days, but is still capable of infecting others. To be truthful, someone who comes down with noro on the second day of a 7 day cruise probably should not be allowed out of the cabin for the rest of the cruise.

[dylandog25]

sorry but the cruise lines don,t stand a chance with some of the passengers I have come across and to be quite honest I am not going to stay quiet if it happens again, two cases of ladies being politely asked to sanitize their hands and guess what their response was 1 said no I won't I washed them when I got up and the other one said I washed them after I used the washroom

well hello ladies did you actually navigate around a cruise ship without touching a single thing after washing

[RetiredNTraveling]

This thread just scares the bejibbers out of me...:eek:.... I guess that I had better move to the Alaskan Wilderness and become a hermit! Otherwise, I will catch something that will make me sick! :eek:

 

Nah! What the heck, you only live once and if you get sick what better way to say I love you than to give it to your fellow inhabitants of the earth. ;) Let's go cruising and spread the "love" (norovirus)! :D

[SKAGGS1234]

I'll be watching this thread! Jeffry, if you have any more news please let us hear.

 

Thanks

[Posaune]

Once Noro is onboard it is going to spread. Passengers leave their rooms the first day after feeling better, even though they have been confined for two days. (Which according to CDC is not enough time) Passengers blame the cruise line, but they only have their fellow passengers to blame.

[Clutterlady]

Once Noro is onboard it is going to spread. Passengers leave their rooms the first day after feeling better, even though they have been confined for two days. (Which according to CDC is not enough time) Passengers blame the cruise line, but they only have their fellow passengers to blame.

 

Amen Posaune.....people can say what they want, but passengers bring it on..end of story!!!!

[douglinc@msn.com]

Has anyone heard an update? Has there been any more cases reported? How many are there?

 

Doug

[need2cruisesoon]

Amen Posaune.....people can say what they want, but passengers bring it on..end of story!!!!

 

Really, you think the spread of Noro is from passengers only? Consider the crew, the people that work as food handlers and wait staff are also a factor for spreading Noro. Bad hygiene and not washing hands (after bathroom use) is not only exclusive to the passengers.

[Mom33]

Really, you think the spread of Noro is from passengers only? Consider the crew, the people that work as food handlers and wait staff are also a factor for spreading Noro. Bad hygiene and not washing hands (after bathroom use) is not only exclusive to the passengers.

 

That's true. Every human being can carry and spread the noro. But with three times the passengers as crew, the odds are that it will be brought on board by passenger and passed to the crew. Most noro counts have many more passengers than crew ill. The crew are trained for noro outbreaks. Passengers are not.

[caribill]

That's true. Every human being can carry and spread the noro. But with three times the passengers as crew, the odds are that it will be brought on board by passenger and passed to the crew. Most noro counts have many more passengers than crew ill. The crew are trained for noro outbreaks. Passengers are not.

 

Only a very small percentage of crew go on shore at any port including embarkation ports whereas 90%+ of passengers at an embarkation port are new to the ship and 75% plus get off at each port.

 

Yes, crew can bring noro on board, but they have much less opportunity to catch it on shore.

[crackupforlaughs]

I was talking with my husband about CB's noro, our upcoming trip on it, and trying to remember how we felt when we had it years ago (and, as have said before, our young daughter got again a year later but we didn't because we treated it like a biohazard).

 

Signs that YOU may have it can begin with you looking at your favorite food that you would normally really want to eat and not want to eat it. It doesn't start with bad nausea (or other) but much before that and when you can possibly take precautions about spreading it. Thinking back on it, had we known, we could have recognized our daughter's first time getting it (and then avoided getting it from her) when she refused to even taste her favorite food. I was around her, thinking she had car sickness, and about 36 hours later -- boom! I had it. But, I remember that I, too, looked at my favorite fish tacos about a day before gettiing this and just didn't want to eat them... didn't feel nauseous, per se, at that point, but appetite-less. I really just wanted Sprite and not much else. Just thought it was heat -related (we were on vacation visiting my parents in warm weather). Later the horror started and spread to my husband, mom and dad (and dad ended up in the ER).

 

As for crew workers or anyone else -- wearing gloves is only as good as one's cleansing habits. I've witnessed on far too many occassions fast food workers, thinking (I guess) that they are "protected" by wearing gloves, rub their hands in their hair, touch money and then touch food, while still wearing that "protective" pair of gloves and not changing them. Ewww..

[Loonbeam]

There is a difference between spread and origination. Once onboard, even staff with the best intentions can aid in spread. That said, once the ship has been sanitized, a very large portion of the time, outbreaks will be started by passengers.

 

Really, you think the spread of Noro is from passengers only? Consider the crew, the people that work as food handlers and wait staff are also a factor for spreading Noro. Bad hygiene and not washing hands (after bathroom use) is not only exclusive to the passengers.

[RDC1]

Really, you think the spread of Noro is from passengers only? Consider the crew, the people that work as food handlers and wait staff are also a factor for spreading Noro. Bad hygiene and not washing hands (after bathroom use) is not only exclusive to the passengers.

 

The crew tends to be better trained then the passengers. They are also confined longer and unlike passengers it means their job to violate confinement.

 

The percentage of crew that get it, is always a much much lower percentage then the passengers that get it during an outbreak.

 

You do not have very many crew change out each stop, unlike passengers that pretty much all change out. Thus very few new crew vectors, lots of passengers.

[WisCruiser2]

We were on the CB last week, and fortunately, did NOT get sick. DH overheard a woman saying "You know the crew gave everyone Noro so they could get back to port early...." :rolleyes: I should think that the crew wants an outbreak even LESS than the passengers do! Not only, in our case, did they lose out on a day's worth of tips, they had to work harder! Once the ship went on Red Alert, crew were constantly wiping down everything, more staff had to work the buffet, the waiters had more to do, you get the picture...

[BruceMuzz]

This isn't entirely true. Or, perhaps it isn't true for the reasons you think. People seem to think that cruise ships bear a disproportionate level of publicity when it comes to noro, but that level of attention is warranted. While you are correct that one can contract noro in a variety of places, the reason that you hear about it more on cruise ships is that cruise ships are unique in their setup such that the rate of infection is far greater than in the general population. If 10 people out of 4,500 have noro in the gereral population, the odds of 700 becoming infected over the span of a week are slim to none. If 10 people have it on a cruise ship and do not follow quarantine protocols, the odds of 700 people contracting the virus are far greater.

 

So while it might seem that cruise ships get an "unfair rap" when it comes to noro, the truth is, cruise ships are floating Petrie dishes when it comes to the virus. Sure, hospitals are known to have outbreaks too. But many hospital patients stay in their hospital rooms 23 hours a day, do not use handrails to descend stairs, do not push elevator buttons as frequently, do not go to buffets and handle food and/or utensils, and they do not roam around the entire grounds of the hospital the way passengers roam around a ship. Land-based resorts are susceptible to the same issues, but people check in and check out on a daily basis, so you don't have the same 4,500 people confronting each other for 7-10 straight days. Infected people travel back home and infect people on the plane, or back home, and the concentration of infected people gets dispersed to the point where it is largely unnoticed. Cruise ships really are different in that you have a concentrated population that does not come and go, and everyone passenger has only one or two "degrees of separation" from every other passenger.

 

Last year in America there were 21 Million reported cases of NLV. Many people - myself included - believe that the numbers are much higher, as many people with "stomach flu" do not report it to the CDC or local hospital.

The CDC estimates that 10% of the US general population has NLV every year. If they are correct, around 30 million Americans have NLV every year.

 

Last year the international cruise industry carried just under 20 million passengers.

Approximately 4,000 of them were reported to be affected by NLV.

There were probably another 4,000 who contracted NLV on a cruise, but did not report it.

That comes to around .05% of total cruisers suffering NLV, versus 10% of the American general population.

 

By my rough estimate, you are 20 times more likely to suffer with NLV at home in America, than you are to suffer from it on cruise.

Edited February 7, 2014 by BruceMuzz

[Loonbeam]

I'd say the 4000 estimate is a little low, if you count all lines.

 

There are at least 35 ships just based out of America, which means on average, if only 2 people per day per ship report, you are looking at 2100 per month over 4 months. 14 people on a week cruise with 3000 pax would even still be probably conservative.

 

Last year in America there were 21 Million reported cases of NLV. Many people - myself included - believe that the numbers are much higher, as many people with "stomach flu" do not report it to the CDC or local hospital.

The CDC estimates that 10% of the US general population has NLV every year. If they are correct, around 30 million Americans have NLV every year.

 

Last year the international cruise industry carried just under 20 million passengers.

Approximately 4,000 of them were reported to be affected by NLV.

There were probably another 4,000 who contracted NLV on a cruise, but did not report it.

That comes to around .05% of total cruisers suffering NLV, versus 10% of the American general population.

 

By my rough estimate, you are 20 times more likely to suffer with NLV at home in America, than you are to suffer from it on cruise.

[BruceMuzz]

We were on the CB last week, and fortunately, did NOT get sick. DH overheard a woman saying "You know the crew gave everyone Noro so they could get back to port early...." :rolleyes: I should think that the crew wants an outbreak even LESS than the passengers do! Not only, in our case, did they lose out on a day's worth of tips, they had to work harder! Once the ship went on Red Alert, crew were constantly wiping down everything, more staff had to work the buffet, the waiters had more to do, you get the picture...

 

When a ship goes to Code Red with an NLV outbreak, the crew loses far more than a day's tips.

A high percentage of the passengers decide not to tip at all - blaming the crew for the problems. This substantially reduces the salaries of the crew.

The tipped crew, who normally work 13 hours maximum per day, are forced to work much longer hours. We get paid a monthly salary which already includes any overtime. That salary does not go up when the working hours increase.

Many tipped crew and their management are eligible to receive a performance bonus based on guest ratings and comments.

Guest ratings and comments take a very negative turn when the ship is in Code Red, resulting in zero performance bonuses.

[BruceMuzz]

I'd say the 4000 estimate is a little low, if you count all lines.

 

There are at least 35 ships just based out of America, which means on average, if only 2 people per day per ship report, you are looking at 2100 per month over 4 months. 14 people on a week cruise with 3000 pax would even still be probably conservative.

 

Excellent point.

The 4,000 estimate came from CDC. But just like their estimates on total number of Americans affected at home, I suspect that they are far too optimistic.

 

Let's assume that CDC is wrong by a factor of 10, and 40,000 passengers (800 per week)were actually affected by NLV last year while on a cruise.

That means that approximately 0.25% of cruisers suffered, versus the 10% (or more) of the American general population who stayed home and got sick.

The odds of staying well on a cruise still look pretty good.

[Jkool9999]

I'm on this ship. It's crazy. Zombies and Aliens everywhere taking over the ship.