A fully-vaccinated passenger aboard Celebrity Millennium tested positive for COVID19. The passenger was on an Alaska cruise when the individual exhibited cold-like symptoms. Medical professionals on the ship were notified of the situation.
After the symptoms, the person then tested positive for COVID19. The passenger ended up in the ship’s quarantine facility while the staff did its contact tracing. All of the passenger’s close contacts tested negative for COVID.
According to the statement released by Celebrity Cruise, the person was “provided private air transportation back to the comforts of home, ensuring that our safety measures were maintained from door-to-door”.
Susan Lomax, who is Celebrity Cruise’s spokesperson, said that the ship was in Skagway on Tuesday and was set to return to Seattle on Friday.
Robert Barr, Juneau’s deputy city manager, said that the fully-vaccinated passenger aboard the Celebrity Millennium stopped in Alaska’s capital city on Monday. He said that “I think that we were never expecting the cruise season to be entirely COVID free”. Barr also added that he is confident in the city’s effort along with the cruise industry and health department to ensure the safety of everyone involved.
Vaccines Work But Not Perfect
Since it happened to a fully-vaccinated passenger, should there be a concern for future cruise passengers? State epidemiologist Dr. Joe McLaughlin said that vaccines’ effectiveness is “exceptionally high”. However, he also said that it is “not perfect”. 74% of Juneau residents 12 years old and up completed their vaccine doses.
CDC’s COVID Guidelines
The cruise industry operations stopped for more than a year. In recent months, US Centers for Disease Control relaxed its guidelines. Under the updated conditional sailing order, ships can sail once again. However, cruises should either maintain a specific vaccination threshold or run a test voyage. The health agency required the ships to have 95% of their crew and passengers vaccinated if the cruise line wants to skip the test voyage with volunteer passengers.