Dr. Fauci: "Above all, don't get on a cruise ship."

[mkkao924]

39 minutes ago, SUESEABE said:

http://bq-magazine.com/covid-19-travel-update-fauci-says-cruising-is-ok-if-you-are-healthy/

 

Quote from that article:

"The Cruise Industry’s COVID-19 Silver Lining: Only 13% Of Customers Are Over 70 Years Old".

 

Wonder what's the percentage for HAL?

[Aquahound]

2 minutes ago, kazu said:

 

Not cruising right now and being stuck on a ship and not going to the United States where there is no protocol in place and little leadership from what I have seen.  Sorry. But that’s the way I see it.

 

I'm genuinely curious.  What do you mean by no protocol in place? 

[kazu]

12 minutes ago, mkkao924 said:

 

Quote from that article:

"The Cruise Industry’s COVID-19 Silver Lining: Only 13% Of Customers Are Over 70 Years Old".

 

Wonder what's the percentage for HAL?

 

I’ve cruised on NCL, Oceania, Princess, Celebrity and more and I’ve never seen a cruise ship have only 13% customers over 70.  Sorry but it’s not just a fact for me based on my experience.

in fact when we did our NCL transatlantic we saw so many people with walkers and even nurses that was when DH and I said we would cruise while we were healthy.

I am not in that age group and I have a lot of friends I have met on cruises who are but the fact of the matter is I’ve NEVER EVER been on a cruise when the percentage was that low in over 35 years.

[Frank5]

For me, the unique health risk of a cruise during the next 1 to 3 months is that there is a significant risk that the ship will be subject to a quarantine if just one passenger or crew member is suspected to have contracted a Coronavirus resulting in the ship being turned away at scheduled ports and the healthy passengers being subject to a greater risk of contracting the virus onboard while the cruise line tries to find a port that will allow the ship to dock.  While I would not take this chance and cancel my reservation, others would be less risk adverse.

[atexsix]

All I'm doing is hemming/hawing.

 

Over the weekend we were pretty sure our sailing wouldn't be taking place.  Yesterday I was trying to figure out a way to make it work.  This morning I was back to going through with the trip, now tonight I'm back to canceling.....ugh! 

 

I gave up on the news, it's no longer informative, it's all about keeping people glued to their screens.  And the officials have yet to decide if they are going to bar ships from docking, suspend the season, or cancel it altogether.  With one side of the political spectrum optimistic and the other painting doomsday scenarios, it's increasingly hard to make choices. 

 

We thought about just bagging our cruise plans for the year and focusing on land based trips, but even that is in limbo because of so many cities/states considering partial or full scale lock downs; we're concerned about its effect on air/train travel.  

 

I'm just sad and depressed and trying to find a way to cheer up, having a vacation planned always worked wonders for us in the past and now we can't even do that anymore.

 

 

[crystalspin]

We were gonna cruise (28-day So.Pacific sailing on the 21st) up until yesterday. Dr.Fauci's presentations spooked my public-health background physician husband, and I realized that if either my frail mother or my not-robust sister became ill -- with anything not only COVID19 -- I needed to be home to step up to the plate.

 

So I called today -- PCC away from her phone for the rest of the month (!) -- push 0 to wait for an operator. Only 20 minutes! She sounded very tired, but she was efficient. 

 

Already contacted my Princess CVP to cancel June's RT/LA Alaska trip that mom/sis/BIL were going to accompany us on. Way too many risk factors. 

 

Going to cancel August's Copenhagen northern TA sailing as well, for family reasons not COVID related. Probably wait until April to do that. Still have to cancel private shore excursions for the Alaska trip.

 

Chagrining! as I am more prepared for the So.Pac and Alaska cruises than I think I've ever been! Going to put all the things into a box ready to go for the next cruise!

[Wehwalt]

I thought we had been asked by mods to avoid starting new coronavirus threads. 

[GeriatricNurse]

53 minutes ago, Wehwalt said:

I thought we had been asked by mods to avoid starting new coronavirus threads. 

Exactly correct!  So this (uninformative) thread needs/should be shut down, (promptly)!

[CruiserBruce]

3 hours ago, Wehwalt said:

I thought we had been asked by mods to avoid starting new coronavirus threads. 

Agree...many threads here on being on the fence. 

[golfer1903]

Please stop canceling. This is media blown out of proportion like always

 

do you ever look up how many people get sick and or worse from flu in the USA every single year

 

please don’t fall into the media trap or political  agenda possibly to crumble the country by scaring the nation for no reason

 

pleas live your life.   You have a better chance of getting stuck by lighting in a rain storm .  Do you run and hide when it’s raining??

[blackfoot]

Thinking about it- sailing in late July but 1st deposit will be shortly coming due. If HAL doesn't allow another push out on the deposit, I will cancel.

I happen to think the virus is a media event- it's the flu! But, I do not want to spend big $$ on a boat ride and a logistic nightmare to get home if Europe shuts down/closes Ports etc. I lived in several countries in Europe for years and they will shut it down to isolate themselves if they believe they will be harmed-Cruise ships may not become a welcome sight this Summer!

[bEwAbG]

14 hours ago, Aquahound said:

I'm genuinely curious.  What do you mean by no protocol in place?

 

Here is an example:

 

Two close congressional allies of President Trump underwent coronavirus testing in recent days in apparent defiance of federal recommendations reserving those tests for patients exhibiting symptoms of infection — and amid growing concerns about the availability of testing for Americans who are sick.

 

Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), the latter of whom Trump named last week as the next White House chief of staff, both said in statements that the tests showed no infection after exposure to a coronavirus carrier at the annual

Conservative Political Action Conference last month in suburban Washington.

 

The two lawmakers also said they were exhibiting no symptoms of respiratory illness, raising questions of why they were tested at all.

 

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/trump-allies-got-coronavirus-tests-despite-lack-of-symptoms-and-shortage/2020/03/10/e9512064-62e7-11ea-b3fc-7841686c5c57_story.html

[fatcat04]

23 minutes ago, bEwAbG said:

 

Here is an example:

 

Two close congressional allies of President Trump underwent coronavirus testing in recent days in apparent defiance of federal recommendations reserving those tests for patients exhibiting symptoms of infection — and amid growing concerns about the availability of testing for Americans who are sick.

 

Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), the latter of whom Trump named last week as the next White House chief of staff, both said in statements that the tests showed no infection after exposure to a coronavirus carrier at the annual

Conservative Political Action Conference last month in suburban Washington.

 

The two lawmakers also said they were exhibiting no symptoms of respiratory illness, raising questions of why they were tested at all.

 

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/trump-allies-got-coronavirus-tests-despite-lack-of-symptoms-and-shortage/2020/03/10/e9512064-62e7-11ea-b3fc-7841686c5c57_story.html

As much as Congresspersons and Senator travel and mingle especially internationally or with those who come here from overseas (I seem to remember 2 even visited with some Iranian officials in Munich in February not long before Iran witnessed it's first case on Feb 19th), I do not begrudge any of them testing. The more testing the better. S. Korea, though a significantly smaller and more racially and socially homogeneous country, has had good success with over 200k tested, electronic monitoring of those infected, and disciplined social distancing practiced. They have not and will not lock down cities from what I have read.

Good article: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3074469/coronavirus-south-korea-cuts-infection-rate-without

 

Clever idea here from the article: "South Korea has also come up with creative measures, including about 50 drive-through testing stations across the country, where it takes only 10 minutes to go through the whole procedure. Test results are available within hours."

Edited March 11, 2020 by fatcat04

[Himself]

On 3/8/2020 at 10:57 AM, SumoCitrus said:

From this morning:   

 

 

 

This is pretty intense. My parents were discussing their upcoming cruises with me this morning and whether they should go.

 

 

 

This is ridiculous.  If I was scheduled to go on a ship I would do it.

[fatcat04]

Just now, Himself said:

 

 

This is ridiculous.  If I was scheduled to go on a ship I would do it.

I understand Father. We all need to make the best decisions for ourselves and our families. We hated to cancel but it was necessary.

 

Some of us have to cancel for the sake of older vulnerable family members and also in my husband's case, he has many older clients. Should he accidentally bring home the bug from ship or plane ride and unknowing infect them, not only would they be harmed, his career would be over. His company has instituted new travel, vacation, and illness protocol that employees are required to follow as a condition of employment.

 

Let us hope as the temperatures warm, this virus is as vulnerable to summer time as the flu is and in that time we can get everything under control.

[AV8rix]

7 minutes ago, Himself said:

 

 

This is ridiculous.  If I was scheduled to go on a ship I would do it.

What is ridiculous?  With all due respect, Father, I hope that you're not referring to Dr. Fauci's statements.  Or to SumoCitrus' concern over the well-being of his/her parents.

[GRACECRUISE]

I hate it that I am going to have to cancel my dads 88th birthday cruise.  But I can not take the chance or the guilt if he or mom were to catch it.   I have not pulled the trigger but with 2 weeks out I will have to do it soon.   If it were just me I would go.  He catches the cruise crude on 14 day cruises sometimes, so can not chance it.

 

What make this one bitter is that we finally got the free cruise casino offer and had a fantastic rate.  Looking at 2 week fall cruises to move it to - this whole two week cruise will not cover one person in the fall!  Drats!

[3rdGenCunarder]

4 minutes ago, GRACECRUISE said:

I hate it that I am going to have to cancel my dads 88th birthday cruise.  But I can not take the chance or the guilt if he or mom were to catch it.   I have not pulled the trigger but with 2 weeks out I will have to do it soon.   If it were just me I would go.  He catches the cruise crude on 14 day cruises sometimes, so can not chance it.

 

What make this one bitter is that we finally got the free cruise casino offer and had a fantastic rate.  Looking at 2 week fall cruises to move it to - this whole two week cruise will not cover one person in the fall!  Drats!

 

I know you're disappointed, but it sounds like a good decision, given his age and apparent susceptibility to respiratory infections. Maybe you can find something special and local to celebrate his day. Not as good as a cruise, but safer.

[Hlitner]

Yes, we are "thinking" about cancelling an August cruise, on Princess, because it involves some significant European travel after ipthe voyage.  Another issue is that the cruise includes a stop in Edinburgh where we have tickets for the Tattoo.  Depending on the situation nearer are voyage, we have some concern that the Tattoo will be cancelled to avoid a large public gathering.  

 

So what to do?  In our situation we will not make a decision until near our final payment date which is in May.  Our air is booked, but not ticketed, through the cruise line which has an identical air program to HAL's.  So one possible strategy would be to cancel the cruise and air just before final payment (no penalties) and then consider again booking the same cruise at the last minute when we have a good idea of the then current situation.

 

I should mention that the post cruise European travel is all on our own (we do not like tours) and involves flights from Southampton to Paris and later flight from Paris to Prague.  If we did ultimately cancel the trip we would eat the cost of those air tickets which we view as an acceptable loss.  The cost of trip insurance would have cost us more then the cost of those tickets.  Another option would be to simply fly to Europe and actually extend our land time and still use those internal flights.

 

Hank

[Himself]

11 minutes ago, Av8rix said:

What is ridiculous?  With all due respect, Father, I hope that you're not referring to Dr. Fauci's statements.  Or to SumoCitrus' concern over the well-being of his/her parents.

I think the Cruise ship is no more dangerous than any other venue.  This thing started in a city in China and not on a cruise ship. I just think there is too much irrational panic over this. There is difference between actin with fear and acting from fear. Too much of this is from fear. Last week I returned from a wonderful cruise on the Koningsdam.  I went to the parish fish fry and many were worried because I was on a ship. "Are you okay, I was asked?" I said everyone was fine and many were shocked.  I think the cruise industry gets blamed for too much.  

[Qcruise]

We're sailing on the Koningsdam April 28th from San Diego to Vancouver.....the prices have plummeted so I'm guessing folks are bailing from the cruise.  That means less people, more room for us and great service from the crew.  We plan on staying the course until closer to the March 31st date to cancel......hoping the situation will determine our ulitmate plan by then.

[ozzie0075]

2 hours ago, golfer1903 said:

Please stop canceling. This is media blown out of proportion like always

 

do you ever look up how many people get sick and or worse from flu in the USA every single year

 

please don’t fall into the media trap or political  agenda possibly to crumble the country by scaring the nation for no reason

 

pleas live your life.   You have a better chance of getting stuck by lighting in a rain storm .  Do you run and hide when it’s raining??

 

It's more the fear of being quarantined for folks. Some companies are also requiring employees to wait 2 weeks before returning to work if they leave the country.  

[AncientWanderer]

I trust Dr. Fauci's recommendations.  I remember when there was the ebola scare, he was really conservative in his approach, and I was worried that he was too conservative.  As it turned out, he managed that crisis really well.  So this time around, I have a lot of confidence in the recommendations he is voicing and have no problem doing as told.

[Cruising-along]

We are keeping our booking (39-day Sydney-Vancouver April 2).   But yes it's been a roller coaster.  If I had a European cruise booked (thank heavens we went last year and have another booked for next year) I would cancel though.  So unless HAL cancels this cruise we're going.  We live near Seattle too, I actually feel less safe just getting groceries etc. here (although it isn't anything like a "ghost town" as someone else reported!!

 

We're both in good health.  A possible quarantine wouldn't affect us TOO much. We're retired, have no responsibilities or elder parents to worry about or pets or children at home.  Doing everything possible to stay healthy so we can go!

Edited March 11, 2020 by Cruising-along

[atexsix]

6 hours ago, GeriatricNurse said:

Exactly correct!  So this (uninformative) thread needs/should be shut down, (promptly)!

Then ask for them to do it.

 

It's hard to start a new topic in an existing thread without hijacking it, changing it, and introducing topics within topics.

 

But if that's the way you feel, contact the mods.