The boss of Carnival Corporation says the Omicron variant has caused some near-term cancellations but remains confident there will not be any lasting impact on cruise bookings.
Speaking on fourth quarter financial results call on Monday (December 20), when Carnival reported a net loss of $2.6 billion for the fourth quarter, president and chief executive Arnold Donald played down concerns about the Omicron variant that has been reported in 89 countries so far.
He indicated that the cruise giant, which operates 94 ships across nine brands, would use experience from the Delta variant to manage the impact of Omicron.
Donald said: “We completely recovered in November from [Delta]. We’ll have to see how this plays out.
“The great news is it appears to date that scientists and medical experts around the world [agree] that while this variant is highly infectious, it seems to have a less damaging effect on people.”
Donald highlighted the group’s “very effective protocols” and company-wide vaccination programme which has seen more than 10,000 crew members receive booster jabs so far.
“We’ve not seen any major impact in terms of bookings in the second half of 2022 and 2023,” he added. “It’s hard for me to quantify any impact. We do see a little spike in near-term cruise cancellations, but the booking patterns are strong.
“Booking volumes continue to build for the remainder of 2022 and well into 2023 and we are achieving those early bookings with strong demand and pricing.”
Although the company was “not anticipating anything” in terms of a booking downturn from Omicron, Donald said: “The bottom line is this is a dynamic situation. [The protocols] have worked and will continue to work.
“There have been lower incidences of cases [on cruise ships] than in the society at large. In most cases they have minor symptoms or are asymptomatic, that is an increasing trend.”
Chief financial officer David Bernstein called 2022 the “tale of two halves” due to the company forecasting a net loss early next year before reporting a profit for the second half of 2022.
“Cash from operations over the next few months will be impacted by restart-related spending and dry dock expenses as 28 ships almost a third of our fleet will be in dry dock of the first half of fiscal 2022,” he explained.