A cruiseship belonging to Carnival Corp subsidiary Princess Cruises has been hit with a 24-hour quarantine order in Japan after a previous passenger on the ship tested positive for the Wuhan coronavirus.
Princess, in a statement released Tuesday morning, confirmed that Japanese health authorities have refused to allow any passengers of crew to disembark from the 115,900-gt Diamond Princess (built 2004), which is currently anchored off Yokohama.
The company said that a passenger on the ships previous voyage that ended in Hong Kong on 25 January tested positive to the coronavirus six days after disembarking from the vessel.
The company stressed that the passenger did not display any symptoms or signs of illness while on board the ship.
“The hospital reports that he is in stable condition and the family members travelling with him remain symptom-free,” the company stated.
“The turnaround of the Diamond Princess has been delayed for approximately 24 hours to allow Japan public health authorities to review the health status of all guests and crew on board.”
The Diamond Princess is carrying 2,666 passengers and 1,045 crew.
The company has also cancelled the ship's next cruise, which was scheduled to depart Yokohama on Tuesday afternoon.
The quarantining of the Diamond Princess comes right after authorities in the Philippines refused to allow Holland America Line’s 82,900-gt Westerdam (built 2004) to dock in Manila following Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte’s temporary ban on travellers from China, Hong Kong and Macau entering the country.
The Westerdam had embarked passengers in Hong Kong immediately prior to its planned visit Manila while on a month-long cruise from Singapore to Shanghai. The ship will complete its cruise in Yokohama instead of Shanghai.
Cruise lines flee China for Taiwan
The coronavirus outbreak has wreaked havoc with cruise companies operating the Chinese market. All cruises have cancelled.
Genting Cruise Lines, which originally intended to stop embarking and disembarking passengers in Guangzhou, but carry on operations out of Hong Kong, has instead moved its 150,000-gt World Dream (built 2017) across the Taiwan Strait to Keelung, where it will operate cruises to nearby Japanese islands for a two-month period.
Royal Caribbean International has also moved its 169,000-gt Spectrum of the Seas (built 2019) to Taiwan for a two-month period.
Travel sources in Taiwan say that the last-minute deployment of two large ships into Taiwan has led to very deep discounts being offered to attract Taiwanese passengers on board.
MSC Cruises is sending its 138,000-gt MSC Splendida (built 2009) to Singapore to embark passengers for a repositioning cruise to Europe.
Costa Crociere, another Carnival Corp subsidiary, has yet to announce any future plans for the four cruiseships it operates out of China. Three of the vessels have been moved to anchorages in South Korea, Japan and Vietnam, and a fourth vessel, the 135,000-gt Costa Venezia (built 2019) departed Shanghai without passengers on Monday. It is believed to be heading for temporary lay-up in either Japan or South Korea.
Single-ship Chinese operators Astro Ocean Cruises and Bohai Cruise Co have both temporarily suspended cruise operations, leaving their ships sitting idle in Chinese ports.
International cruise lines that have cruise calls scheduled for Hong Kong and China have also begun to divert their ships to ports in Taiwan and the Philippines.
As fears about the spread of the coronavirus continue, the Cruise Line Industry Association (CLIA) and its 60 cruise line members have banned people who have been to China in the past two weeks from boarding their cruiseships. The ban went into effect on 31 January.
Similar bans are being issued by countries worldwide.
