Genting Cruise Lines has cancelled a cruise scheduled to depart Singapore on Wednesday after a passenger on its cruiseship World Dream tested positive for Covid-19 on Tuesday night.

The Singapore Tourism Board said a 40-year old passenger, who tested negative prior to boarding the 150,700-gt World Dream (built 2017) on Sunday, had been identified late on Tuesday as being a close contact of a positive case ashore.

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Health authorities notified the ship, operated by Genting’s Dream Cruises brand, which led to the company’s CruiseSafe protocols developed jointly with classification society DNV immediately being put into action.

The passenger was immediately isolated in the ship’s quarantine facilities and administered a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) that returned a positive result just after midnight local time on Wednesday morning.

Authorities said the passenger had been fully vaccinated and was asymptomatic.

As part of the World Dream's Covid-19 containment systems, a large portion of one passenger deck has been turned into a secure quarantine and isolation facility. The facility has been fitted with additional HEPA filters and negative air pressure to avoid contaminated air entering other parts of the ship. Photo: Jonathan Boonzaier

Three other people in the same travelling party as the passenger were also isolated. They too were administered Covid-19 tests, but these came back negative.

All other passengers were asked to return to their cabins.

The ship docked in Singapore on Wednesday morning, cutting short the cruise by several hours. The infected passenger and travelling companions were immediately transferred to a shore-based hospital for further testing.

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Other passengers were asked to remain in their cabins until official confirmation of the test results and contact tracing was complete.

Dream Cruises said the World Dream would undergo full cleaning and sanitisation, and a two-night cruise that was scheduled to depart on Wednesday evening has been cancelled as a precautionary measure.

Singapore allowed the resumption of cruises last November, provided ships followed a strict set of protocols based on measures that were implemented within the city-state.

The cruises are not allowed to call at any foreign ports.

The Singapore Tourism Board tasked classification DNV with creating a cruise-compliance audit and certification programme for cruise lines operating out of the Lion City.

Apart from one false positive test on Royal Caribbean’s 169,000-dwt Quantum of the Seas (built 2014) in November last year, no other passenger had tested positive for Covid-19 until Wednesday.