Data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that 1,359 laboratory-confirmed Covid-19 cases were reported on cruise ships that sailed from US ports in the summer.
Numbers involve passengers and crew on board sailings taking place between June 26 and October 21 this year.
Figures were buried in documents released when the CDC extended its Framework for Conditional Sailing Order (CSO) for cruise ships until January 15, 2022, last week.
The CDC said 49 of those cases required hospitalization, and 38 called for medical evacuations.
Clia estimates 600,000 passengers sailed from US ports between June and October; not including crew.
The CDC said that, despite the cruise lines’ implementation of strict protocols to prevent the introduction of Covid-19, “ensuring passengers are uninfected at embarkation has proven difficult”.
It reported several instances of passengers being symptomatic on the day of their embarkation and denying symptoms, or passengers’ being symptomatic for several days onboard the ship before reporting symptoms
However, the CDC noted that “high vaccination rates onboard these cruise ships likely explain why onboard medical center resources have not been overwhelmed.”
Speaking on a Travel Weekly webcast, the boss of Norwegian Cruise Line said the line’s ships have so far avoided any Covid outbreaks since its fleet started coming back into service in July.
Currently, the line has seven ships back in the water – half of the fleet’s bed capacity – and the remaining 10 ships are scheduled to return before April. It has a 100% vaccination policy on board, which has been extended ‘indefinitely’.
President and chief executive Harry Sommer said NCL taken the decision to “err on the side of safety” during the pandemic.
He said: “We’re not trying to get a lot of guests on our ships. Right now, we’re happy just to be back in the water. When [Norwegian] Bliss came back in we have half of our fleet in the water which is great because like three months ago, there was 0% of our ships in the fleet.
“So, in a three-month period to get to half [the fleet’s capacity] we think is a huge milestone that we’re happy but we’re doing it in a safe way for our guests.”
NCL has surveyed past passengers to determine how many had been fully-vaccinated against Covid-19 and found that 93% were immunised.
Sommer said he had recently had a booster jab, adding that his family had joined him on the line’s first cruise back out of Athens in July and on Bliss last month which demonstrated how safe he felt NCL’s sailings were.
Speaking on parent company Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ third quarter update, chief executive Frank Del Rio said “the prevalence of cases we identified in preboarding testing, mid-cruise and at debarkation were inconsequential and well below what we all saw in the general population during this time.”