Originally published at: Cruise ships continue to carry COVID-19 | Boing Boing
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When the first cruises allowing Americans restarted in spring 2021, all major lines were sailing with at least 90% of passengers vaccinated against COVID-19. That meant they required just about everyone on board to have their shots, with few exceptions allowed for young children and people who can’t be vaccinated due to medical conditions or religious beliefs.
But now, little more than a year later, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has withdrawn its opt-in guidance for cruise lines, and many are now allowing more unvaccinated passengers to sail. -thepointsguy
Guess we know the crowd that’s attracting.
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Another reason to avoid those floating petri dishes.
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I love cruises, but it will be years before I take another one. When I bring up these news stories (and lack of tracking / reporting) to my cruise-loving relatives, they shrug it off because they see vaccination as a pass to “get back to normal.” All I can do is hope they escape serious consequences, but if that happens I won’t be shocked.
The forces of profit over people are always busy finding ways to convince folks to pay for things and/or take actions that are harmful. 
I wish more of the consequences would fall on those who make these decisions, instead of their customers and employees.
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I wouldn’t go on a cruise if you paid me…
yeah. There’s a quip down the corridor around the micro(biology) labs, that research grants ought to be written to NIH to place an infectious disease lab on a cruise ship. sort’ve a front-line “field work office”, if you will. (“But it has to have a ‘surfing wave pool’ set-up”, asserted the younger lab tech)
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Since this is sort of a Covid tread, I’m curious how many people have NOT had it.
Up until about Dec or Jan of last year, pretty much everyone that we knew had avoided getting Covid. Now every single person we know in our circle of friends and family has had it at least once. Except my wife and me. Everyone was shot and double boosted. Most if not all were mild cases. All of us have been living our lives pretty much the same since March of 2020. Stayed home, eventually got vaccinated, then fully vaccinated, etc… Started slowly doing things relatively normally, but cautiously, etc. In the last year, I’ve traveled a lot on planes and will be taking two flights next month alone for work
I did participate in a NYTimes survey where they wanted to hear from people who had never gotten it, but I never did hear back from them.
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As far as I know* we haven’t caught it yet, either. We test within the correct parameters if we have sniffles/coughs, but no positive tests so far (I had a sinus/ear infection at our first temp drop; on cue). I still mask up in stores, but my SO does not, and is at work (office) full time. We eat out weekly, but generally in sparsely populated restaurants, or outside. Pretty much everyone we know has had it. And not subtly, either; big effects felt by all.
I’m grateful for science, and we’re about to test this bigly by going to Italy in a few days. N95-ing the whole plane trip, no exceptions except a straw.
*Maybe we’re the silent carrier?
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I’m sure I’m jixing myself, but so far the wife and I have dodged. I’m fairly certain for her but very sure for me. Because of my job, I got tested almost constantly, and was an early reciever of the vaccines. I’ve kept up since then, only going long on my second booster to wait for the omicron one to come out. This is despite multiple outbreaks in my home, and me caring for those people.
I’ve made sure to mask responsibly, although I don’t necessarily wear it in a mostly empty store, and wash/sanitize my hands pretty frequently. I generally avoid large crowd situations normally, so that recommendation is also in play. You know, the basic recommendations.
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Only if it includes hazard pay. Lord, can you imagine, though!
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They’re petri dishes. They’ve always been petri dishes. It’s just there’s a nastier thing in the dish than usual.
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Thus far, we have managed to avoid it. Outside of the office, where I swim in it daily, we pretty much live like hermits. Masks are worn on the few times we go out, and we have gotten all the vaccines available. However, echoing @DiveGirl, this is very much “as far as we know.” No one has been symptomatic or teste positive, but do we really know? No, we do not.
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Remember when all you had to worry about was shitting your brains out?
Ah, yes, the Good Ol’ Days ™
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I haven’t had it (with the same “as far as I know” caveat). Got every shot and booster, and limited going out to essential trips. Fortunately, there are a lot of delivery services in my area. I’ve been double-masking when outside of my home since that was first recommended.
The only exceptions were two gatherings involving eating and drinking in the past two months. So far, there haven’t been any symptoms from that. 
However, I’m done going out for the year, and will rely on Zoom until the weather gets warmer.
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Yea, I don’t know. I do know that I have never tested positive and I have tested a lot over the last couple years. I haven’t been sick at all. In that regard, I’ve really not been sick for over 7 years, probably in part because I’ve been working from home all that time.
I have to admit I’ve not read a lot of scientific details on whether people who test and/or appear to be Covid free and could possibly spread it.
One thing that worries me as we carry on into the holiday season is that people are NOT getting the latest booster and from what I understand, lots are also not getting flu shots.
I had an interesting conversation with my primary care physician (who also didn’t have an answer as to why some people haven’t gotten it) around some of this. One, he said he was at a conference recently and asked if anyone there had not had Covid. No one raised their hand.
He also told me that for the most part, we’re just going to have to likely live with this. Likely forever. His opinion. And people can or cannot decide to keep themselves vaccinated, same as with the flu - even though it’s more dangerous to the population at large.
I have to admit, for the most part, my wife and I in the last year have pretty much gone back to our normal lives. We both work from home - I have for some time and my wife started in March of 2020 - but we kind of started going out to eat more and we’ve also seen more live music in the last year.
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My wife and I had both (as far as we know) managed to avoid it until we traveled to Italy in July to go on a cruise. We were both up to date on vaccinations/boosters and wore N95s mostly everywhere we went, and had tested negative on a PCR test on arrival in Rome (a requirement to get on the ship)
Its a bit unclear from the timeline if I picked it up before hand (on the flight over, the train trip to meet the ship in Naples, or the day we had in Naples before getting onboard), but it seems most likely it was onboard.
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I don’t think so. If I had it, mom would probably have had it, and at 96, I doubt asymptomatic would be in the cards.
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No one in our house as far as we know, my mother and stepfather seem to have avoided it (maybe there’s an incident that makes me think asymptomatic cases for them), or my closest friends. Most of the people in my immediate circle are fully vaxed and still on some degree of substantial social restriction, though even the most cautious have dropped from their peaks.
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