Test required to enter St Maarten if arriving on Edge

[Arzeena]

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Edited July 10, 2021 by Arzeena

[Denny01]

8 minutes ago, harkinmr said:

I'm pretty sure the cruise line is trying to keep it quiet, but it may end up being in the press eventually with social media and all.  A couple of YouTube bloggers are now talking about it.  With the "update" to the rules, it would make sense that the two are connected.  I can imagine St. Maarten is probably pretty mad about it, and to protect their own people going forward they're going to do what they need to do and not rely on Celebrity to do it.  Consequences.

Completely agree St Maarten must protect it’s people, and being an island it has more options, but the inference that they couldn’t ‘rely’ on Celebrity kind of misses the mark in my view. This was 2 very selfish people who planned on doing this and pulled it off. Being unvaccinated already shows they had no care for themselves, family and others around them or community and their actions show the same.

 

I bet most of us have been on ship tours and even with the requirements of only using a ship tour in a port, you Know there are ways of sneaking off. Ports are full of locals and workers and so on, and no matter how you handle it, people could find a way of sneaking away and going on their own. So it is those people, not Celebrity that is fully responsible for such consequences. I assume the post I reference meant that, but it can be read as Celebrity could not be relied on. Unless they had the passengers walk off like a chain gang and did the same at all the stops, its impossible to insure this couldn’t happen…….I think. 

 

Den

 

 

[Sweet Dreams]

Unaware there were any unvaccinated adults on the sailing, thought I had read only unvaccinated children. 

[AbbyCruiser45]

1 minute ago, Sweet Dreams said:

Unaware there were any unvaccinated adults on the sailing, thought I had read only unvaccinated children. 

There is 5% capacity for unvaccinated guests including adults and children. The children don't have to pay for the extra tests, but the adults do which should be a bigger deterrent, but not enough apparently.  

[harkinmr]

22 minutes ago, Denny01 said:

Completely agree St Maarten must protect it’s people, and being an island it has more options, but the inference that they couldn’t ‘rely’ on Celebrity kind of misses the mark in my view. This was 2 very selfish people who planned on doing this and pulled it off. Being unvaccinated already shows they had no care for themselves, family and others around them or community and their actions show the same.

 

I bet most of us have been on ship tours and even with the requirements of only using a ship tour in a port, you Know there are ways of sneaking off. Ports are full of locals and workers and so on, and no matter how you handle it, people could find a way of sneaking away and going on their own. So it is those people, not Celebrity that is fully responsible for such consequences. I assume the post I reference meant that, but it can be read as Celebrity could not be relied on. Unless they had the passengers walk off like a chain gang and did the same at all the stops, its impossible to insure this couldn’t happen…….I think. 

 

Den

 

 

Point well taken.  And I wasn't trying to imply that it was Celebrity's fault.  They did what they needed to do all the way around, and the blame for the incident lies squarely on the shoulders of the unvaccinated idiots.  But, it was my understanding that vaccinated passengers not being tested at US boarding was being waived by the island as a courtesy to the cruise line.  Anyone flying in for a cruise has to be tested.  So now, everyone will have to be tested on board.  The government of the island is just not going to rely on the cruise line representations going forward.  It's unfortunate to say the least.  Certainly not the fault of the cruise line, just the consequences.

 

EDIT:  And I think the "chain gang" reference is exactly the way the excursions are supposed to be handled.  Same way they are done on European sailings.  Again, unfortunate, but understandable.

Edited July 10, 2021 by harkinmr

[Susanb10567]

1 hour ago, Sweet Dreams said:

Unaware there were any unvaccinated adults on the sailing, thought I had read only unvaccinated children. 

Unfortunately not on sailings leaving from Florida since they are recommended not required…I believe sailings out of Alaska would not have this issue because they are required for adults.

[Sweet Dreams]

33 minutes ago, Susanb10567 said:

Unfortunately not on sailings leaving from Florida since they are recommended not required…I believe sailings out of Alaska would not have this issue because they are required for adults.

I understand that , I have read lots. But I thought I read from those posting live from edge on the recent sailings that there were no adults unvaccinated only children. Perhaps they were only guessing. 

[djh]

Just now, Sweet Dreams said:

I understand that , I have read lots. But I thought I read from those posting live from edge on the recent sailings that there were no adults unvaccinated only children. Perhaps they were only guessing. 

There were no unvaccinated adults on the 6/26 cruise. We were told there were two but then told later that they chose to move their cruise to a later date. It is my understanding that there were some unvaccinated on the 7/3 cruise.

[pixiedust777]

2 minutes ago, Sweet Dreams said:

I understand that , I have read lots. But I thought I read from those posting live from edge on the recent sailings that there were no adults unvaccinated only children.

Celebrity is using the 95/5 rule.

95% vaccinated

5% unvaccinated - so these passengers could be either adults or children.

 

[Susanb10567]

4 minutes ago, pixiedust777 said:

Celebrity is using the 95/5 rule.

95% vaccinated

5% unvaccinated - so these passengers could be either adults or children.

 

I believe only on Florida cruises people will encounter unvaccinated adults because according to the healthy sail chart the vaccine is required for over 16 and over 12 starting Aug 1st. For the other ports of embarkation.

[Elkins45]

We’re on the first Equinox sailing. I’ve decided if X or St. Maarten requires a text to leave the ship I’m just staying onboard. Too much risk of a false or asymptomatic positive getting you stranded in a foreign country and having to scramble to get home.

Edited July 11, 2021 by Elkins45

[Cruising89143]

10 hours ago, pixiedust777 said:

I will be honest we have no intention of getting off at any of our ports of call for our August 7th cruise. Test or no test. All the ports but Nassau are curated tours only and I am not paying what Celebrity is asking just to be able to get off the boat for a few hours. When we booked we had decided that we were cruising for the ship not the ports.

We were booked on this sailing and decided that we did not want to deal with any changes that could occur plus the only port that interested us was St. Maarten. We moved to May of next year out of Rome. Hoping that things calm down soon. 

[KKB]

34 minutes ago, Elkins45 said:

We’re on the first Equinox sailing. I’ve decided if X or St. Maarten requires a text to leave the ship I’m just staying onboard. Too much risk of a false or asymptomatic positive getting you stranded in a foreign country and having to scramble to get home.

Yep, my POV too

[Oville]

56 minutes ago, Elkins45 said:

 Too much risk of a false or asymptomatic positive getting you stranded in a foreign country and having to scramble to get home.

Asymptotic is very different from a false positive.

[Ken the cruiser]

30 minutes ago, Oville said:

Asymptotic is very different from a false positive.

So I wonder what protocol kicks in if you get a false positive onboard, or are the antigen tests becoming more accurate than when they first started being used? @TeeRickany educated thoughts on this? 😎

Edited July 11, 2021 by Ken the cruiser

[tori0417]

18 hours ago, KKB said:

I'm curious--will they test ALL passengers or just those officially getting off in St. Maarten?

I assume just those getting off due to cost.

Mom & I booked an excursion in St. Maarten but she said let's just stay on the ship so we don't have to get that damn swab up our noses! 

I wonder how many others will think the same thing...

We aren’t getting off at any port when we go in 2 weeks. There are just too many unknowns and we aren’t “tour” people. With the last year and half we had, we are perfectly happy to stay on the ship and relax

[TeeRick]

8 hours ago, Ken the cruiser said:

So I wonder what protocol kicks in if you get a false positive onboard, or are the antigen tests becoming more accurate than when they first started being used? @TeeRickany educated thoughts on this? 😎

Ken at the risk of being removed I will briefly answer your question.  It is directly related to cruise protocol so hopefully ok.  Yes antigen tests are better now.  False positives by an antigen test should be pretty infrequent.   False positives will likely be tested again with another antigen test or by PCR (if the ship has this capability).  Hopefully you would be in the isolation area on the ship while this is happening.  The antigen test detects active infection in your nasal passage (ie, viral antigens are being produced).  It will be less accurate than the highly sensitive PCR test for asymptomatic infections.  

 

You can test positive and be asymptomatic with a PCR test - at the dock for example- and probably denied boarding.  It might be very early in your infection.  It takes a couple of days for the virus to actually produce antigen after exposure, so the antigen test will not pick up a very early infection.  

Hope this helps.😎

[mac_tlc]

20 hours ago, KKB said:

 

Gotta get off in CM to get Mama some vanilla.

Personally I still have the bottle I bought in Costa Maya 17 years ago!!! (it doesn't go bad & it's BIG)

 

Too funny! We also need to refill our supply. We usually get it in Coz. We have an Allure sailing in August that stops at both ! 
 

mac_tlc

[Ken the cruiser]

1 hour ago, TeeRick said:

Ken at the risk of being removed I will briefly answer your question.  It is directly related to cruise protocol so hopefully ok.  Yes antigen tests are better now.  False positives by an antigen test should be pretty infrequent.   False positives will likely be tested again with another antigen test or by PCR (if the ship has this capability).  Hopefully you would be in the isolation area on the ship while this is happening.  The antigen test detects active infection in your nasal passage (ie, viral antigens are being produced).  It will be less accurate than the highly sensitive PCR test for asymptomatic infections.  

 

You can test positive and be asymptomatic with a PCR test - at the dock for example- and probably denied boarding.  It might be very early in your infection.  It takes a couple of days for the virus to actually produce antigen after exposure, so the antigen test will not pick up a very early infection.  

Hope this helps.😎

Thanks!! Just what I was hoping to hear.