Bahamas drops testing requirement

[Shorewalk Holmes]

2 minutes ago, tallnthensome said:

...... and what if It was zero out of 5000 ? Shall we continue on with this nonsense ? You need to let it go....... 

 

Of course not. See post #38.  

[cured]

3 hours ago, hazeleyes46 said:

If people stopped testing and stopped talking about it, it would go away. It would be like every other cold/virus/illness. 

Ah yes, the old "if I put my head in the sand it does not exist" thought process. Now where have we heard the "if we stop testing, it will go away philosophy" propaganda? 

 

Guess if I don't take a pregnancy test, I can't possibly be pregnant.

 

I just read an article today that said that while immunity from both vaccines and natural immunity is slowing deaths down to its lowest point in the pandemic, the death rate is still higher than car accidents or strokes (covid 300+ deaths a day, motor vehicle accidents 100 per day.)  You are more 3x more likely to die from covid than from driving to the port. But more importantly, debilitating long covid is still a big issue.

 

That said, as anal as I am about mask wearing still (immune compromised) and vaccine proponent, I do think testing 2 days before is ridiculous. Nobody is isolating after their negative tests, they are going about their business. With Omicron's approximately 3-5 day incubation period, a test 2 days before is not going to stop a whole lot of covid from getting on the ship.

 

And no, because of my immune system, cruising is not in the cards right now, so before anyone says just stay home, that is exactly what we are doing.

 

Edited June 21, 2022 by cured

[smokeybandit]

40 minutes ago, cured said:

Ah yes, the old "if I put my head in the sand it does not exist" thought process. Now where have we heard the "if we stop testing, it will go away philosophy" propaganda? 

That's literally how the H1N1 pandemic ended.  Obama called for the end of mass testing and they stopped reporting cases

[smokeybandit]

42 minutes ago, cured said:

I just read an article today that said that while immunity from both vaccines and natural immunity is slowing deaths down to its lowest point in the pandemic, the death rate is still higher than car accidents or strokes (covid 300+ deaths a day, motor vehicle accidents 100 per day.)  You are more 3x more likely to die from covid than from driving to the port. But more importantly, debilitating long covid is still a big issue.

Unlike covid, we don't count you a car accident death if you die within 30 days of being in a car accident.

[Shorewalk Holmes]

57 minutes ago, cured said:

Ah yes, the old "if I put my head in the sand it does not exist" thought process. Now where have we heard the "if we stop testing, it will go away philosophy" propaganda? 

 

Guess if I don't take a pregnancy test, I can't possibly be pregnant.

 

I just read an article today that said that while immunity from both vaccines and natural immunity is slowing deaths down to its lowest point in the pandemic, the death rate is still higher than car accidents or strokes (covid 300+ deaths a day, motor vehicle accidents 100 per day.)  You are more 3x more likely to die from covid than from driving to the port. But more importantly, debilitating long covid is still a big issue.

 

That said, as anal as I am about mask wearing still (immune compromised) and vaccine proponent, I do think testing 2 days before is ridiculous. Nobody is isolating after their negative tests, they are going about their business. With Omicron's approximately 3-5 day incubation period, a test 2 days before is not going to stop a whole lot of covid from getting on the ship.

 

And no, because of my immune system, cruising is not in the cards right now, so before anyone says just stay home, that is exactly what we are doing.

 

 

You have been a voice of reason on these boards, and I respect your opinion greatly.  So before quibbling about one of your points, I should make sure I understand it.

 

I agree that people could be exposed to covid after a negative test on Days 2 or 1, so current testing misses those people.  Testing at boarding would stop more covid than testing two days out. I can see why, from a medical point of view, you'd say testing 2 days out (instead of at boarding) is ridiculous. But as a passenger with a few cruises since opening, I'm not sure I would have booked them if I could be denied boarding after flying all the way to port. It's a compromise, maybe a bad one.

 

However people do actually test positive at Day 2 and Day 1 (from being exposed in the days previous), and they do get denied boarding.  The number of such people will depend on how widespread covid is. 

 

Clearly, as you say, this number would be smaller than you'd get if everyone were tested at port. But is there a reason why this number must be insignificantly small?  Why couldn't it be large (but not as large as port testing) if community spread is high?

  

 

Edited June 21, 2022 by Shorewalk Holmes

[Lane Hog]

And now CCL brand P&O is dipping it's toes into the waters of no more testing...

https://cruise.blog/2022/06/cruise-lines-dont-require-pre-cruise-covid-test

[rudeney]

While I do agree that ignoring a problem does not make it go away, testing doesn't either.  The only way to prevent COVID from being brought onto a cruise ship is to have each person begin testing 10 days from their cruise, and be totally quarantined until the cruise.  Of course once onboard, there could be no shore excursions or contact with people who had not been tested and quarantined for 10 days prior.  Short of that, or until the SARS-CoV-2 virus mutates to the point of being benign, there will always be COVID on cruise ships, and other places where large numbers of people closely congregate.  A snapshot test taken two days prior to boarding is a waste of time, money, and anxiety.

[Shorewalk Holmes]

57 minutes ago, rudeney said:

Short of that, or until the SARS-CoV-2 virus mutates to the point of being benign, there will always be COVID on cruise ships, and other places where large numbers of people closely congregate.  A snapshot test taken two days prior to boarding is a waste of time, money, and anxiety.

 

Agree that some covid is always likely to be on cruise ships, at least for now. 

 

But can we agree that less covid is better than more covid?  Every time someone with covid doesn't board, you get less covid on the ship.

 

We apparently don't have the data to be absolutely sure it's worth the time and money.  I hope somebody in charge does.

[Lane Hog]

31 minutes ago, Shorewalk Holmes said:

But can we agree that less covid is better than more covid?  Every time someone with covid doesn't board, you get less covid on the ship.

You can still test negative for a week or longer after exposure, so all that testing is stopping is the few who were exposed over a week ago and don't have symptoms...

Those who got past the testing will then be at their most contagious partway thru the cruise.

 

[rudeney]

2 hours ago, Shorewalk Holmes said:

 

Agree that some covid is always likely to be on cruise ships, at least for now. 

 

But can we agree that less covid is better than more covid?  Every time someone with covid doesn't board, you get less covid on the ship.

 

We apparently don't have the data to be absolutely sure it's worth the time and money.  I hope somebody in charge does.

 

According to CDC research, a person infected with the highly contagious Omicron variants can infect between 7 and 14 other people with close contact.  "Close contact" is defined as being within 6 feet of infected persons for a cumulative total time of 15 minutes or more.  On a cruise ship with between 3,00 and 6,000 passengers, it won't take long for one infected person to infect the minimum 7 others, and for those 7 others to infect 7 others, etc.   But that doesn't seem to be the case.  Instead of "super spreader" events, we have anecdotal reports of some cruise passenger testing positive.  Hmm....

[Shorewalk Holmes]

2 hours ago, Lane Hog said:

You can still test negative for a week or longer after exposure, so all that testing is stopping is the few who were exposed over a week ago and don't have symptoms...

Those who got past the testing will then be at their most contagious partway thru the cruise.

 

 

It would be great to know how many cases the testing is not finding. But the number that counts the most is the number of positive cases that testing finds before boarding.  Because if this number is actually very small, then maybe testing wouldn't be warranted. 

 

Unfortunately, out of thousands of passengers, there could be many who were exposed a week before and test positive. I haven't seen data that suggest any credible number.

 

Edited June 22, 2022 by Shorewalk Holmes

[bucfan2]

12 hours ago, cured said:

cruising is not in the cards right now, so before anyone says just stay home, that is exactly what we are doing.

 

Perfect.  So whether there's testing or not doesn't effect you at all.

Edited June 22, 2022 by bucfan2

[Ocean Boy]

7 hours ago, bucfan2 said:

Perfect.  So whether there's testing or not doesn't effect you at all.

But how fortunate is it that someone it looking out for the welfare of those of us who are cruising.

[hazeleyes46]

On 6/21/2022 at 6:14 PM, cured said:

Ah yes, the old "if I put my head in the sand it does not exist" thought process. Now where have we heard the "if we stop testing, it will go away philosophy" propaganda? 

 

Guess if I don't take a pregnancy test, I can't possibly be pregnant.

 

I just read an article today that said that while immunity from both vaccines and natural immunity is slowing deaths down to its lowest point in the pandemic, the death rate is still higher than car accidents or strokes (covid 300+ deaths a day, motor vehicle accidents 100 per day.)  You are more 3x more likely to die from covid than from driving to the port. But more importantly, debilitating long covid is still a big issue.

 

That said, as anal as I am about mask wearing still (immune compromised) and vaccine proponent, I do think testing 2 days before is ridiculous. Nobody is isolating after their negative tests, they are going about their business. With Omicron's approximately 3-5 day incubation period, a test 2 days before is not going to stop a whole lot of covid from getting on the ship.

 

And no, because of my immune system, cruising is not in the cards right now, so before anyone says just stay home, that is exactly what we are doing.

 

Actually I just read an article that spoke about testing and vaccines for cruise ships from this weekend and out of all the ships that have gone out since they started cruising again, only 2 people have died from covid. The death rate is not very high for cruising and not sure where you got your number for car accidents...

 

Each year, 1.35 million people are killed on roadways around the world. Every day, almost 3,700 people are killed globally in crashes involving cars, buses, motorcycles, bicycles, trucks, or pedestrians. More than half of those killed are pedestrians, motorcyclists, or cyclists.