Final Friday, December 2nd, plenty of newspapers within the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI) reported on the COVID-19-related loss of life of a cruise passenger in St. Thomas.
The Virgin Islands Consortium reported that “a critically unwell cruise ship passenger wanted emergency care shortly earlier than arriving in St. Thomas. Upon arrival the person was taken to the Schneider Regional Medical Middle however later succumbed to the sickness.
The newspaper additional reported that the cruise visitor was transported to the hospital from the WICO (West Indies dock) dock on November, 29.
Cruise Ship Passenger Dies of COVID-19 After Hospitalization on STT
Not one of the newspapers disclosed which cruise ship the contaminated visitor arrived on, nor the variety of contaminated passengers or crew members on the cruise ship. No cruise line, in fact, admitted to the an infection resulting in the loss of life of their buyer throughout the cruise.
It seems that three cruise ships referred to as on St. Thomas (and ported on the WICO facility) on November twenty ninth: NCL’s Norwegian Escape (photograph proper), Princess Cruises’ Sky Princess (photograph under) and Silversea Cruises’ Silver Moon.
NCL lifted its ban on unvaccinated passengers in early September with NCL CEO Del Rio touting that easing vaccine and testing protocols would “develop the addressable cruise market.” All different cruise strains relaxed their vaccination and testing necessities as properly. Not surprisingly, cruise ships crusing to the Caribbean with 3,000 to 4,000 passengers usually have a median of a number of hundred passengers contaminated with COVID-19. With over 8,000 individuals doubtlessly ashore on 
November twenty ninth, there have been undoubtedly many cruise contaminated friends who visited the island.
The precise variety of contaminated cruise friends / crew members on the Norwegian Escape (4,248 friends), Sky Princess (3,560 friends), and Silver Moon (596 friends) when these cruise ships arrived in St. Thomas on November twenty ninth is just not publicly identified.
The U.S. Virgin Islands, which has a comparatively low loss of life complete resulting from COVID-19 of simply 125, made a degree of stressing that the lifeless cruise visitor was not contaminated within the territory and subsequently wouldn’t be included within the official COVID statistics.
It was only a yr in the past that the Disney Fantasy referred to as on the West Indies Co. dock in St. Thomas however the port authority didn’t allow anybody to disembark as a result of there have been optimistic COVID-19 instances aboard the cruise ship. As of March of this yr, the Virgin Islands well being fee didn’t allow cruise ships, with energetic COVID instances exceeding a 3% threshold, to disembark within the islands (cruise strains had been requesting a 4 p.c an infection charge).
The St. Thomas Supply lined this newest story, writing “the newest loss of life is a reminder that the COVID-19 virus stays a risk regardless of the comfort of masking and distancing mandates, and the division continues to encourage the general public to change into absolutely vaccinated and boosted.”
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Photograph credit score: St. Thomas Supply “a hundred and twenty fifth COVID-Associated Dying Confirmed by Well being Division;” Norwegian Escape – kees torn – SA 2.0 commons / wikimedia; Sky Princess antonio -, CC BY 2.0 commons / wikimedia.
