US vice president Mike Pence plans to meet with the cruise sector's top chief executives to discuss Covid-19 coronavirus' impact on the otherwise growing industry.
The meeting with Pence, who is overseeing the Trump administration's response to the virus is set for Saturday in Florida, Reuters has reported.
The virus has caused numerous headaches for the sector over the past several weeks, from quarantines on contaminated ships to cancelled voyages to battered shares.
Carnival Corp, Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings expect to lose $555m combined in 2020 earnings as a result of the virus.
Calls to the world's three largest cruise providers and the White House press office were not immediately returned.
Carnival's shares have fallen to $32.45 Wednesday from $51.90 on 17 January, while Royal Caribbean's stock has dropped to $79.06 from $135.05.
Norwegian's shares have likewise tumbled, sliding to $33.01 from $59.96 within the same timeframe.
The "Big Three" cruise majors have banned travel to and from China and will not take passengers who have been there in the past two weeks as a precaution against the illness.
The worst case of coronavirus at sea took place last month aboard Carnival's 115,900-gt Diamond Princess (built 2004).
The ship was quarantined for three weeks off Japan as more than 700 passengers became infected with the virus and another four died from it.
Other cruise companies have also experienced virus-related troubles, including MSC Cruises.
Jamaica's Cayman Islands turned away its 172,000-gt MSC Meraviglia (built 2017) last week, preventing 4,600 passengers from coming ashore.
Pence was scheduled to meet with airline executives today and with executives for 3M, which is ramping up respirator mask production, on Thursday, according to Reuters.
The virus has infected almost 91,000 people and killed more than 3,100 worldwide since being discovered in Wuhan, China in early January.
