A whopping 65 new coronavirus cases have been confirmed aboard a cruise ship quarantined off the coast of the Japanese port of Yokohama, bringing the total number of infections discovered on the unfortunate vessel up to 135.
Even before this latest update, the Diamond Princess represented easily the largest concentration of coronavirus cases outside of China. The country of Singapore comes in next with 43 cases.
Of these new cases, 45 are Japanese, 11 are Americans, and the rest are from Australia, Canada, England, the Philippines, and Ukraine.
There were around 3,700 passengers and crew aboard the ship when it arrived off the coast of Japan last week and was halted by authorities after it was discovered that a passenger who took a cruise on the vessel late last month had tested positive for the coronavirus upon arriving back in Hong Kong.
While the cruise was scheduled to end on February 4, all those on board will have to remain quarantined until at least February 19… though it will likely be even longer than that with the WHO instructing that passengers should remain isolated for two weeks after their last close contact with someone infected by the virus.
Passengers have mostly been confined to their rooms, allowed to go up on deck only during assigned 90-minute shifts.
Food and other necessities are brought to their door. They are being provided with free internet and phone service along with expanded movie options and games to play to stave off the boredom of being on a cruise that doesn’t move.
The cruise ship’s operator, Princess Cruises, has announced that it refund all passengers their full fare and all other expenses. It also said it would give them future travel credit for a voyage of equal value to this one… though we imagine most might be a bit sick of cruises at this point.
There is better news to report in Hong Kong where the thousands of people who were trapped on another cruise ship for four days after several crew members came down with fevers have been allowed to disembark.
