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Cruise ships and vaccination requirements

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Scotrail12

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Will people actually be allowed to get off of these cruises and wander around anywhere ? Otherwise, you may as well just book into a nice hotel and wander up and down the prom (assuming they end the lockdown at some stage).
I heard rumours that it would be compulsory tours from the cruise line around ports and whilst the ship is in port, it gets cleaned. Guests apparently not allowed to wander around ports themselves and a possibility that crew members won’t be allowed off the ship much or even at all throughout their contract.
 
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yorksrob

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I heard rumours that it would be compulsory tours from the cruise line around ports and whilst the ship is in port, it gets cleaned. Guests apparently not allowed to wander around ports themselves and a possibility that crew members won’t be allowed off the ship much or even at all throughout their contract.

I suppose you get a bit of a look around places then.
 

raetiamann

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I would guess Saga is happy initially at least to take smaller numbers, for a number of reasons. We've done a couple of Saga cruises in the past, but won't even consider one for this year at least.
 

AnyFile

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I might be misunderstanding, but if the vaccine doesn’t prevent transmission then does it make any difference if others aren’t vaccinated? Especially if one has had the vaccine one’s self.

This is in my opinion a crucial point that has not been clarified enough.
They have triumphantly told has that the vaccination is 95% efficient, but they have not told us enough well which efficiency they are speaking about. It (just) means that probably(!) one person that has undergone the full vaccination cycle would have the 95% of probability in not to develop a serious form of Covid.

However this does not tell us that all the people who have got the vaccine will be safe.

Even much more important this does not tell us anything about the protection against infection.

As far as I know there are not yet enough data to speak about what the vaccines do against the possibility of infection and it is very high probably that they can not block it.

It is extremely risky to consider the vaccination a licence to relax restriction or to think that the people vaccinated are exempt from the possibility of getting ill or infected
 

yorksrob

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This is in my opinion a crucial point that has not been clarified enough.
They have triumphantly told has that the vaccination is 95% efficient, but they have not told us enough well which efficiency they are speaking about. It (just) means that probably(!) one person that has undergone the full vaccination cycle would have the 95% of probability in not to develop a serious form of Covid.

However this does not tell us that all the people who have got the vaccine will be safe.

Even much more important this does not tell us anything about the protection against infection.

As far as I know there are not yet enough data to speak about what the vaccines do against the possibility of infection and it is very high probably that they can not block it.

It is extremely risky to consider the vaccination a licence to relax restriction or to think that the people vaccinated are exempt from the possibility of getting ill or infected

And what's your suggestion if the the vaccination doesn't block infection. Restrictions for ever ? Won't be possible. If it does block transmission - great, if not, we will just have to get on with it and take the risk I'm afraid.
 

Bantamzen

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This is in my opinion a crucial point that has not been clarified enough.
They have triumphantly told has that the vaccination is 95% efficient, but they have not told us enough well which efficiency they are speaking about. It (just) means that probably(!) one person that has undergone the full vaccination cycle would have the 95% of probability in not to develop a serious form of Covid.

However this does not tell us that all the people who have got the vaccine will be safe.

Even much more important this does not tell us anything about the protection against infection.

As far as I know there are not yet enough data to speak about what the vaccines do against the possibility of infection and it is very high probably that they can not block it.

It is extremely risky to consider the vaccination a licence to relax restriction or to think that the people vaccinated are exempt from the possibility of getting ill or infected
The whole point of the vaccines are to considerably reduce the risk of becoming seriously ill. Infection is still going to be possible, in fact once the body stops producing anti-bodies post vaccination is likely. However the point is to "train" the immune system to recognise the proteins that make up the key parts of the virus and trigger both T-cell activation to shut down infected cells, as well as the restart of antibody production where needed (and this won't always be needed if the T-cells manage to supress the virus quickly enough).

This is how the body deals with all pathogens, and always has. Science has known this for some time. What is new is that somehow this knowledge has been supressed by daft politicians and lazy media hacks.
 

greyman42

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I would guess Saga is happy initially at least to take smaller numbers, for a number of reasons. We've done a couple of Saga cruises in the past, but won't even consider one for this year at least.
With all the rules in place about mask wearing and what you can and can't do it does not sound like there would be any pleasure in taking the cruise. Will people seriously consider spending significant sums of money on these cruises and will the uptake be so poor that they simply end up getting cancelled?
 

raetiamann

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I'd tend to agree with you Greyman42, but some may be so keen to travel again. BE interesting to see what happens.
 

Scotrail12

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With all the rules in place about mask wearing and what you can and can't do it does not sound like there would be any pleasure in taking the cruise. Will people seriously consider spending significant sums of money on these cruises and will the uptake be so poor that they simply end up getting cancelled?
More than likely, nobody in their right mind would waste thousands of pounds on such a dictated holiday. I've been reading the cruise ship forums and even the people there are unhappy at the COVID rules for sailing. I'm fairly pessimistic about the future of the cruise companies sadly as if even the most ardent cruisers are reluctant to go, how the heck are they going to get the average member of the public onboard?
 

Scotrail12

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Royal Caribbean cruises are doing some sailings on one of their ships out of the UK. A blog site has published an article covering the COVID safety protocols onboard.


Vaccine Requirement
At this time, all Royal Caribbean guests 18 years and older must have completed all doses of their COVID-19 vaccine at least 14 days before sailing. Guests younger than 18 don’t need to be vaccinated — but if they are, they can follow the testing guidance for fully vaccinated guests.

Please note that all crew onboard Anthem of the Seas will also be fully vaccinated.

It goes on to say this:
If you are not fully vaccinated before the sailing because the healthcare system is working by age group, you will not be able to sail.

Given that the UK is a country where vaccines are administered based on age (and health conditions), this means that anyone in a younger age group cannot sail. This is blatant age discrimination and I cannot believe that a corporation is doing this!!! I've lost so much respect for this company (who I have sailed with several times) for this policy.

What are your thoughts on this? This is exactly the reason why I'm so opposed to vaccine passports. Apparently this isn't even the case for ships out of the USA so why is it policy for a UK based ship?
 

Freightmaster

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Apparently this isn't even the case for ships out of the USA so why is it policy for a UK based ship?
I think that both RCI and Carnival Group would like it to be policy worldwide (as they desperately want to avoid
a repeat of the Diamond Princess saga at all costs), but Florida and Texas have explicitly forbidden cruise lines
from requiring guests to be vaccinated.


Scotland on the other hand have done the opposite:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-57406705


A ship full of less than a thousand fully vaccinated, tested, UK residents cannot dock in Scotland because
of some vague, unspecified "risk", even though thousands of English tourists are allowed to visit Scotland
by car/coach/train each week without any tests or proof of vaccination whatsoever!! o_O




MARK
 
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Cdd89

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Disney Cruise Line also instituted this requirement - applicable on U.K. staycation cruises.

I think a rolling exemption for those below <eligibility age as of twelve weeks ago> would be fairer. It’s arbitrary anyway that 17 year olds are allowed on the cruise with testing but 18 year olds are excluded.
 

Lloyds siding

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This is blatant age discrimination and I cannot believe that a corporation is doing this!!!
And, as had been pointed out to you before: this is NOT 'blatant' age discrimination, nowhere do the cruise lines demand that you have to be a certain age, other than the 'seniors' cruise line, Saga.
If, say, you were a 20 year old NHS worker, who had received two vaccinations months ago then you could sail! The 'age discrimination' is being practised by the NHS in its vaccine rollout, not by the cruise companies.
 

Cdd89

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It may not be age discrimination, but it is certainly not a reward for young people, who have suffered the most as a result of the restrictions for the least personal benefit. Are there any other domestic contexts where testing is not an alternative to vaccination?

Also, will domestically operating cruise lines be given the tools to decode the 2D barcode for validation purposes (assuming that this don’t get made public anyway). I would strongly argue that they should not be provided with this; they are not a foreign border with a legitimate interest.
 

ainsworth74

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I think it could be - but we'll only know for sure if someone takes the matter to court, which I doubt anyone will.
Exactly. My personal gut feeling is that it isn't or at least that it will be found to be a reasonable action (restricting to full vaccinated people) to a legitimate aim (health and safety of staff and guests). But! The only way we'd know would be for someone to take legal action.

Certainly I think it would be a fascinating case.
 

Watershed

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And, as had been pointed out to you before: this is NOT 'blatant' age discrimination, nowhere do the cruise lines demand that you have to be a certain age, other than the 'seniors' cruise line, Saga.
If, say, you were a 20 year old NHS worker, who had received two vaccinations months ago then you could sail! The 'age discrimination' is being practised by the NHS in its vaccine rollout, not by the cruise companies.
It isn't direct age discrimination but it is about as clear a case of indirect age discrimination as you could get.

Of course, just because there is discrimination doesn't mean it's automatically illegal. Age is only a rather weakly protected characteristic.

Exactly. My personal gut feeling is that it isn't or at least that it will be found to be a reasonable action (restricting to full vaccinated people) to a legitimate aim (health and safety of staff and guests). But! The only way we'd know would be for someone to take legal action.

Certainly I think it would be a fascinating case.
I don't think it would be particularly fascinating really - it would probably take about 2 or 3 years to get to the stage where a decision is made.

And, based on the previous track record of the Senior Courts (being extremely reluctant to do anything other than toe the government line), I would be amazed if they didn't rule it was lawful.

This is one area where I think the laws that Texas and Florida have introduced, banning businesses and state agencies from checking vaccination status, would have merit. At the very least, until everyone has had their chance to get double vaccinated.
 
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