Who has decided to take a summer staycation cruise?

[davecttr]

5 hours ago, wowzz said:

And 62% of the lateral flow tests that are available free of charge, are showing false positives. 

Really, all this palaver about tests at embarkation,  temperature checks etc is pure window dressing. As long as all passengers are vaccinated,  I cannot see why any additional measures are required. 

I do, however, think that MSC are flirting with danger, by not making vaccinations compulsory on their cruises.

Well if P&O decide a pre cruise test is required and that happens over half the passengers will be refused boarding.

 

edit - just checked online and it appears that the best lateral flow tests give very few false positives, around about 1 in 1000, which is what will concern us vaccinated potential cruisers, even so maybe a few people on each cruise are going to be denied boarding. Did I read somewhere that on MSC boarding if you get a positive result they test you again?

 

The concern is more about false negatives which, may I dare risk saying, a cruise passenger won't care about as they just won't to get on the ship.

 

My neighbour is taking two lateral flow tests a week despite being vaccinated. She is hoping to go on holiday later this month and is concerned that the vaccination has not worked. How do you test for this? an antibody test maybe?

Edited May 1, 2021 by davecttr

[Pink-belle]

My family, including extended family have been testing twice a week for 2 months, due to work, none of us so far have had a false positive.   My cousin had a positive lateral flow test in November, but PCR confirmed it was indeed a positive test.

 

the Government are now promoting 2 tests a week for everyone, so they can have a more accurate picture of infections in the country. 

[Windsurfboy]

31 minutes ago, Pink-belle said:

My family, including extended family have been testing twice a week for 2 months, due to work, none of us so far have had a false positive.   My cousin had a positive lateral flow test in November, but PCR confirmed it was indeed a positive test.

 

the Government are now promoting 2 tests a week for everyone, so they can have a more accurate picture of infections in the country. 

 

Anyone would think money grew on trees. Covid Rate amongst vaccinated is 1 in 3000  and soon we will all have at least one dose, so at £25 a test that's £75000 to identify one case. That's more than NHS will spend on life saving cancer drugs to keep someone alive ! Crazy

[grapau27]

5 hours ago, zap99 said:

We like P&O, Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, NCL and a line or 2 that we haven't tried yet. Cost,ship, destination and dates are more important than which company. We are loyal to them all.

If I based my decision on loyalty then our Diamond plus Royal Caribbean loyalty and Elite Princess loyalty would win and we would overlook P&O but we have 2 P&O cruises booked with Mediterranean loyalty offering very little in loyalty benefits.

We like P&O.

Graham.

[Pink-belle]

1 hour ago, Windsurfboy said:

 

Anyone would think money grew on trees. Covid Rate amongst vaccinated is 1 in 3000  and soon we will all have at least one dose, so at £25 a test that's £75000 to identify one case. That's more than NHS will spend on life saving cancer drugs to keep someone alive ! Crazy

I won’t debate the costs of all this testing, it is a job requirement and we comply. 
 

as the positive case in our family was a community physiotherapist working in patients homes, it was a very good thing it was picked up.  There were no symptoms at time of testing. 
 

Testing and having an idea of how much virus is circulating is what is going to allow us to get back to a more normal way of life, I am all for that. 
 

 

[Pink-belle]

6 minutes ago, grapau27 said:

If I based my decision on loyalty then our Diamond plus Royal Caribbean loyalty and Elite Princess loyalty would win and we would overlook P&O but we have 2 P&O cruises booked with Mediterranean loyalty offering very little in loyalty benefits.

We like P&O.

Graham.

You mean you don’t love your P&O slippers 😏 that’s a bit tongue in cheek as I love having slippers on the cruise, but never pack any.

 

I agree Elite benefits on Princess are excellent, that together with the availability of Princess Plus make some cruises better value then they at first seem. 

[yorkshirephil]

5 hours ago, zap99 said:

We like P&O, Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, NCL and a line or 2 that we haven't tried yet. Cost,ship, destination and dates are more important than which company. We are loyal to them all.

We are out and out cruise sluts and will cruise with any line. Loyalty levels don't mean much to us, some of them are useful but not to the extent it would determine who we cruised with. Destination is now more important to us whereas it was cost when we were younger. Dates are not too important now we are retired.

[grapau27]

7 minutes ago, Pink-belle said:

You mean you don’t love your P&O slippers 😏 that’s a bit tongue in cheek as I love having slippers on the cruise, but never pack any.

 

I agree Elite benefits on Princess are excellent, that together with the availability of Princess Plus make some cruises better value then they at first seem. 

We have lots of the slippers from numerous hotels and cruiselines.

[grapau27]

15 minutes ago, yorkshirephil said:

We are out and out cruise sluts and will cruise with any line. Loyalty levels don't mean much to us, some of them are useful but not to the extent it would determine who we cruised with. Destination is now more important to us whereas it was cost when we were younger. Dates are not too important now we are retired.

3 hours of  free drinks every night during loyalty cocktail hours on Royal Caribbean is a big incentive to sail with them.

[yorkshirephil]

1 minute ago, grapau27 said:

3 hours of  free drinks every night during loyalty cocktail hours on Royal Caribbean is a big incentive to sail with them.

Not anymore for us as we drink very little these days

[grapau27]

18 minutes ago, yorkshirephil said:

Not anymore for us as we drink very little these days

Alcoholic and non alcoholic drinks are included in the RC cocktail hours plus unlimited  coffee in the Diamond Lounge.

Edited May 1, 2021 by grapau27

[Windsurfboy]

1 hour ago, Pink-belle said:

I won’t debate the costs of all this testing, it is a job requirement and we comply. 
 

as the positive case in our family was a community physiotherapist working in patients homes, it was a very good thing it was picked up.  There were no symptoms at time of testing. 
 

Testing and having an idea of how much virus is circulating is what is going to allow us to get back to a more normal way of life, I am all for that. 
 

 

 

I wasn't talking about the testing for work especially in health service it was the last suggestion of blanket testing everyone  2 times a week. 

 

But it will be vaccination programme that gets us out of this pandemic,  and if necessary 're vaccination with boosters for variants. The money will be best spent building vaccine factories. It has been shown it is vaccine availability that is is limiting factor, with enough vaccine NHS can vaccinate million plus a day or more, the more factories in UK the better

[wowzz]

2 hours ago, Windsurfboy said:

 

Anyone would think money grew on trees. Covid Rate amongst vaccinated is 1 in 3000  and soon we will all have at least one dose, so at £25 a test that's £75000 to identify one case. That's more than NHS will spend on life saving cancer drugs to keep someone alive ! Crazy

I agree - what is the point of testing those who have been vaccinated ? At times officials just seem to be throwing money at problems that aren't there. 

[zap99]

58 minutes ago, yorkshirephil said:

Not anymore for us as we drink very little these days

I must admit that if the cruise is right, we can buy our own drinks🤣

[Nightingale0208]

Just booked with P&O for September. Got insurance with All Clear quite reasonable price as it includes Covid cover.  As someone who loves sea days and had missed the sea so much, only having one port doesn't bother me at all.  Its put a new spring in my step at last.

[zap99]

1 hour ago, grapau27 said:

We have lots of the slippers from numerous hotels and cruiselines.

Not an attraction to us as I don't wear slippers and the give away ones from hotels are 63p on eBay🤣

[zap99]

7 hours ago, Ardennais said:

To be honest, there’s been little difference in our cruises with P&O and Princess. Granted, I haven’t been on the newer ships. 

We have been on 8 different cruise lines. The one we wouldn't sail with again is................No, can't think of one. Would go on any of them again in a heartbeat🤣

[Nightingale0208]

45 minutes ago, Nightingale0208 said:

Just booked with P&O for September. Got insurance with All Clear quite reasonable price as it includes Covid cover.  As someone who loves sea days and had missed the sea so much, only having one port doesn't bother me at all.  Its put a new spring in my step at last.

Sorry reposted this instead of what I meant to do. So long since I had anything cruise related to talk about,  apart from refunds, I lost my thread as it were.

[peteukmcr]

3 hours ago, wowzz said:

I agree - what is the point of testing those who have been vaccinated ? At times officials just seem to be throwing money at problems that aren't there. 

Because although vaccinated, people can still be carrying the virus and therefore passing it onto others. Vaccination will only hopefully minimise the effects on those who contract the illness and therefore minimise the hospitalisation requirements. 

[Snow Hill]

7 hours ago, wowzz said:

I agree - what is the point of testing those who have been vaccinated ? At times officials just seem to be throwing money at problems that aren't there. 

From Public Health England

 

Even if you have been vaccinated, don't forget the symptoms of COVID-19 and have a plan of what to do if you need to self-isolate, whether you develop symptoms, have a positive test or are notified that you are a contact of someone with COVID-19. If you are instructed to self-isolate you must do so because there is still a risk that you might spread infection to others, even if you have been vaccinated and feel entirely well yourself.

[terrierjohn]

9 hours ago, wowzz said:

I agree - what is the point of testing those who have been vaccinated ? At times officials just seem to be throwing money at problems that aren't there. 

It might be worthwhile for a short period since it  could provide useful data to identify how a new wave could be identified quickly, and then suppressed.

[Windsurfboy]

The point I was making blanket testing of everyone will cost 1.5 billion pounds a week if everyone takes it up . The  ONS statistics show infections amongst vaccinated are extremely low, far lower than they expected. PHE advice is/was based on precautionary principle before the latest real life data from ONS came out. 

 

Two points

 

1) money better spent building more vaccine production facilities,  to both vaccinate UK as needed at high speed,  and produce vaccine for rest of world. 

 

2) Secondly at 75000 pounds to spot one infection within vaccinated population this is more than they will spend on medicine to save one cancer patients  life.

 

We are getting to stage with such low infections where testing should be targeted to potential super spreader activity,  such as getting on ships, mass events , return from abroad all of which should be paid by consumer. Government ie us, should pay for targeted testing of those looking after vunerable. 

 

Can start by focusing testing to unvaccinated , and carers for vunerable,  the number of unvaccinated will rapidly shrink.

 

 

[terrierjohn]

48 minutes ago, majortom10 said:

All very well when you reach that standard but until then you have to pay extortionate prices for drinks. Have never cruised on any cruise line for the loyalty package and like I have said before not being a big alcohol drinker it is the last thing I would look for when booking a cruise is their loyalty scheme.

After 6 cruises with Celebrity we had reached their lowest top tier category, and it also gave us the equivalent level on  Azamara before the sell off, and RCI, and even for a moderate drinker like me, it reduced our bar bill to just daytime drinks and mocktails  and it also gave free wi fi for 2 days between us. 

So far we have done nearly 20 cruises with P&O, and see hardly any worthwhile benefit from our continued loyalty.

[majortom10]

27 minutes ago, terrierjohn said:

After 6 cruises with Celebrity we had reached their lowest top tier category, and it also gave us the equivalent level on  Azamara before the sell off, and RCI, and even for a moderate drinker like me, it reduced our bar bill to just daytime drinks and mocktails  and it also gave free wi fi for 2 days between us. 

So far we have done nearly 20 cruises with P&O, and see hardly any worthwhile benefit from our continued loyalty.

But I bet you pay a lot less for your P&O cruise than you do for your RCI

[majortom10]

1 hour ago, grapau27 said:

We both love cruising Tom which is the main thing.

The loyalty program is a nice thank you by the cruiselines in recognition of our loyalty.

I enjoyed the nice free Elite mini bar set up on our Princess cruises.

P&O lag well behind on their loyalty program and our discount only kicks in when we have used up our large OBC.

But generally Princess cruises are a higher cost than P&O so it isnt really for free. We always give our Elite mini bar up for coffee cards.