Norwalk Virus

[2d's]

I haven't seen anything about Norwalk virus on the boards lately. Does this mean the Cruise Lines counter-measures are working or are they doing a good job of hiding it from the passengers?

 

David

[dosi]

just like cold season or flu season. It is certainly not isolated to cruise ships, but is seen frequently in rest homes and schools. Anywhere you have alot of people in small confines for an extended period of time. I don't think the lack of news is particularly due to counter measures nor to anyone hiding anything. I just think Norwalk is not particularly active right now. As far as secrecy goes, I believe the cruiselines are mandated to report any outbreak to the CDC so when it rears its ugly head again we will ALL know!!

[newcruiserdave]

David,

Norovirus (aka Norwalk Agent) still exists sporadically and there have been some fairly well-controlled limited outbreaks. Certainly things are much better with not only the changes that the cruise industry has implemented, but also with increased awareness of passengers to avoid exposing themselves to risk of contamination with this or the many other potential viruses spread by contact and poor handwashing. I get reports of Noro and other such outbreaks from the CDC or Morbid/Mortality newsletters.

[CruiseFever]

I do know that on our last two Princess cruises that there was a notice about it on our bed when we entered our stateroom. Oddly, on the Caribbean Princess last month they did not have the hand sanitizer positioned at the entrances to the dining rooms and Horizon Court as I'd seen on the Golden earlier in the year.

 

Not sure why that was

 

We always carry that hand sanitizer with us everywhere we go anyway though (from recommendations of this board) and I think that helps...makes my hands smell lovely anyway!

[newcruiserdave]

also see the good review on this site :

a good summary

[Pam in CA]

The other thing is that the media isn't treating an outbreak as a newsworthy disaster. The message has finally gotten through (I hope) that you can just as easily catch the Norwalk virus from a crowded elevator, airplane or wherever as you can on a cruise. The cruiselines are doing a better job of educating passengers and I believe passengers are more aware that they aren't being "jailed" if they're asked to stay in their cabin if they do get the virus. There were many posts by furious passengers who felt they'd been discriminated against.

 

When there are outbreaks, they can pretty much all be traced to passengers bringing it onboard and then refusing to avoid other passengers, touching things that others were using, etc.

[momofmeg]

I had something like that last Feb. did not have it diagnoised-as I did not go the DR-I was well after about 30 hours. It seemed to go through a lot of my friends-seemed like there was around 25 to 30% who got it. My daughter had it 3 days after me. Hubby never got it.

 

Anyway when a ship that carries 2000 passengers and 300 get it-that is not very bad odds when you think about it. Just look around at work and church etc. when a bug is going around-seems a lot mere get it then that.

[newcruiserdave]

Now this is a breakdown of when and which ships reported to CDC (as mandated by law) from 1994 to april 2004:

 

http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/vsp/surv/outbreakslist.pdf

 

increased numbers more due to increased reporting than due to increased numbers of cases.

[PeabodyNVL]

We just had an outbreak of Norwalk here at the University of Maryland for a summer camp program. If course, it did get a bit of media and I say, about time! Norwalk is very common, but the only time the media seems to cover it is when an outbreak occurs on cruiseships.