What Needs To Happen For Me To Regain Confidence In Cruising-A Comprehensive Approach

[Cruiseathoning]

I love to cruise.  Wife and I both do.  Look at my userid!  But for the foreseeable future, if there is such a thing, we will not be.

Many of our friends are from cruising.  Both passengers and crew.  The human toll this monster is leaving in its wake is staggering.

Yesterday I woke up to the thought that the infrastructure of cruising as a whole could be in liquidation by the end of the year.

 

But it may not have to go down like this.  The primary concern I have is not just the virus itself, but getting home.  I had no idea that a ship could float indefinitely with no 

system in place for emergency disembarkation.  This must change.  There has to be an international treaty, agreed upon by the participating nations, for emergency evacuation and medical care, at whatever port the emergency arises.  Of course this would cost, and I expect it would raise costs of cruising.  Also ok.  But these nations have to partner to protect their people and they are not doing so.  This agreement would look like this:

 

1.  Evacuation, containment, treatment, and return home guaranteed to every cruiser based on their national origin.  To pay for this, both the lines and the cruisers would have to pay into a secondary pandemic insurance fund, beyond the normal insurance, and this to me is going to be nearly $100 per person.  In the event of such an emergency, of course that would barely cover a soda, but the idea is that it is an international fund pool that is constantly added to by ships and passengers that do not have such problems.  

 

2.  All participating countries would be refunded from this fund according to personnel and passengers handled not from port nation.  In other words-if the United States handles 17 Mexicans, 37 Australians, and 1500 Americans, then it would "bill" for 54 accommodations.  The international fund would dole out the taxpayer compensation and then collect from the partner nations.

 

3.  All participating countries should develop a portside infrastructure of hospitals and containment at every port.  ALL.  Yes again, costs should be mutually shared.  ALL participating countries must protect the employment and residential status of any passenger quarantined in such a scenario where it is warranted.  This also protects the port nation at large.  Rather than a piecemeal approach we would then have a firm mechanical protocol to rely upon.

 

Vaccines are a must.  Goes without saying.

 

Sanitation should be improved particularly in crew areas.

 

Now some of you will balk because this will raise the cost of cruising.  Well get used to that.  Cruising will probably increase in pricing, perhaps drastically.  Besides any potential commitment to a potential cost sharing treaty, the extra costs for sanitation, perhaps HVAC redevelopment, and a complete restructure of the check-in process, along with a need for full-mini hospitals onboard, and you can expect higher costs.  But you can also expect safer ships in this scenario.

 

One of the options cruise lines can look into, is the "hotel" model.  If a ship does not leave port, or at least american waters, then it is my understanding that the passenger has not left the country itself and thus has not given up an automatic right to re-enter the port.  This is important.  Cruisers have to be confident that if they get on a ship, they will someday be able to get off of it.  The situation the people on the Zaandam and Princess ships were and are facing is a waking nightmare.  The idea that a virulent contagion can spread in a ship with no mechanism for evacuation or treatment is enough to terrify consumers into abandoning the concept altogether.

 

The hotel model allows passengers to embark, drive out a few miles, see a pretty view, enjoy the entertainment, food, and camaraderie and then leave according to more personalized schedule.  This could even be done by tendering.  This way the ships could gain some revenue without being completely out of the ballgame.  Los Angelenos, for example, could do a long weekend for $199 pp, for example, and for these purposes I would highly recommend state legislatures and Feds waive the casino rules so the people can play.  If the passengers could do so knowing their re-entry to the port is not a matter for debate, even if they were to fall ill, the infrastructure to handle the illnesses would already be in place.

 

But for these purposes, it is hard to imagine any line not requiring a certificate of whatever Covid vaccination eventually becomes part of the solution.

 

Because the USA is a configuration of fifty kingdoms, and we now see how truly de-centralized its governance is, Governors themselves will have to cede to Federal authority if my hypothetical treaty were to work.  Will it?  I don't know.  All of these states face particular challenges none of us can really understand, and therefore we can't really justify a critique on their response.  So I am careful not to judge any of these people responsible for decision making in a real life game theory few hypothesized.  The best we can do is learn from this.

 

Will cruising survive?  I think so.  Like any industry it has to adapt and enhance, and it can.  And at some point when we have a vaccine, and ships are improved, and my family can enter a ship knowing there is rock solid international protocol if we face an emergency, I feel we will go back on.  But it won't be soon.

 

And it may not be the brands, or concepts, we once knew.

Edited April 1, 2020 by Cruiseathoning

[NorthWestPassage]

You make some interesting points and offer some creative solutions. However, I do not think that many of those solutions are viable with a practical cruise operation business model and international terms enforcement. Certainly, some changes will be needed and passengers on luxury and near luxury lines will be more financially amenable. Unfortunately, the lion's share of the cruise business is in the mainstream (budget) and premium categories, where more affordable and convenient prospective vacation alternatives will trounce them. You are probably right about the surviving cruise industry being smaller and operating somewhat differently. Only time and passenger expectations will tell.

[LACruiser88]

Well said...

Edited April 1, 2020 by LACruiser88
Error

[LACruiser88]

39 minutes ago, NorthWestPassage said:

You make some interesting points and offer some creative solutions. However, I do not think that many of those solutions are viable with a practical cruise operation business model and international terms enforcement. Certainly, some changes will be needed and passengers on luxury and near luxury lines will be more financially amenable. Unfortunately, the lion's share of the cruise business is in the mainstream (budget) and premium categories, where more affordable and convenient prospective vacation alternatives will trounce them. You are probably right about the surviving cruise industry being smaller and operating somewhat differently. Only time and passenger expectations will tell.

 

[BarbinMich]

IMHO, we have to put the corona virus in perspective.  There are currently 200,000+ cases in the U.S.  The U.S. population is 327 million so the percentage of infected US folks is 0.06%.  I assume that the avg age of a corona virus patient skews towards older people like those who cruise, but I haven't seen such a breakdown.  Yes, it's true that two Princess ships (Grand, Diamond) had a few pax with COVID.  But Princess has 20+ ships.  Perhaps if they take the temp (with the kind of instrument we've seen used in NYC for COVID) of every pax before they board, they can stop those with an above-avg temp from boarding and cruising can resume sometime in the future.

 

In addition to the financial predicament this situation puts the cruise industry in, think what it's done to shore-side businesses who cater to pax in the US ports and in all the foreign ports those ships visited.

 

Let's hope the corona virus dies out sooner rather than later!

Edited April 1, 2020 by BarbinMich

[weedpindle]

Well, I could die tomorrow in a car crash, but I'm not giving up driving.  Many bad things happen in life, but I will still go about my life and not worry myself to death about any of them.

[voljeep]

29 minutes ago, BarbinMich said:

Let's hope the corona virus dies out sooner rather than later!

[Cruiseathoning]

Crashing a car does not generally affect entire populations.  Coming off of a cruise ship with an infectious disease could.

 

Our opinions won't be a factor guys.  These are just ideas, but by no means do I expect deference to them.  

 

The governments, if they decide to step in, are not likely to be consulting us.

[neverbeenhere]

6 minutes ago, Cruiseathoning said:

...

 

The governments, if they decide to step in, are not likely to be consulting us.

Speak for yourself, I'm negotiating for a Cabinet position right now!

[eclue]

As soon as the ships are sailing again, we will be on one!!

These ships have good sanitation as they are - this corona virus is a pandemic that the cruise lines cannot control....

I hope a vaccine is developed sooner rather than later.

Stay safe everyone!

 

[ezd222]

Look at whats happening to the two Holland America ships at the moment. Our own country and government won't take them in. The US Coast Guard has said thanks but no thanks. The FL governor only is willing to take Floridians. It's an humanitarian crisis.  And that stigma is not going to change.

 

Until there is a vaccine or a prescribed medical treatment don't expect there to be cruising. It's too big a risk factor from a embarking standpoint. Whether that's valid point of view we should take is for another debate. The fact is borders are closed and will remain closed as long as they deem a risk to their own population. And now our own country and state borders are debating closures. The President of HAL had to write an op-ed to plea for help and it basically fell on deaf ears.

[nbsjcruiser]

3 hours ago, BarbinMich said:

IMHO, we have to put the corona virus in perspective.  There are currently 200,000+ cases in the U.S.  The U.S. population is 327 million so the percentage of infected US folks is 0.06%.  I assume that the avg age of a corona virus patient skews towards older people like those who cruise, but I haven't seen such a breakdown.  Yes, it's true that two Princess ships (Grand, Diamond) had a few pax with COVID.  But Princess has 20+ ships.  Perhaps if they take the temp (with the kind of instrument we've seen used in NYC for COVID) of every pax before they board, they can stop those with an above-avg temp from boarding and cruising can resume sometime in the future.

 

In addition to the financial predicament this situation puts the cruise industry in, think what it's done to shore-side businesses who cater to pax in the US ports and in all the foreign ports those ships visited.

 

Let's hope the corona virus dies out sooner rather than later!

 

I hate to be the barer of bad news but there are many many more than 200,000 infected in the US. First of all, the infected number you see is only the ones they've found through a very small sample size. Next sad fact - the mortality rate for this virus currently sits around 0.8%. That means 1 out of every 125 people will die from it or in other words, for every death there are about 125 infected people.

 

Currently the US death total stands at around 5000 - that is a verifiable number.  The virus takes about 24 days from infection to symptoms to hospitalization to the ICU to (sadly) death. What this means is that about 24 days ago there were about 125x5000 sick people or  625,000 sick people. Additionally (and again sadly) this increases at a rate of 33% a day meaning it doubles every 3 days. So if there were about 625,000 sick people 24 days ago (March 7 approximately) then on March 10 there were 1.3Million sick and then on March 13 double that again. You get the picture. This is why it is so important to isolate and protect yourself. This virus is dangerous because it spreads so easily and so fast. 

 

This guy does a much better job explaining the mathematical modelling than me: 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/hell-coming-mathematical-proof-185019616.html

 

So long story short, pay little attention to the infection rates until broad based testing is in place and thousands a day can be tested. Until that happens, watch the death rate to get a true picture of what's happening and do the math backwards form there. Bad news I know but we need to be aware.

Edited April 1, 2020 by nbsjcruiser

[OceanPatter]

Thank you, cruisathoning, for bringing up such valid concerns about future cruising, especially your first point. Tossing around at sea with no sure route/passage home is a non-starter for me ... despite how much I love to cruise. 
 

You made great points - food for considerable thought.

[gmjc2]

One simple thing that needs to change is the ridiculously inadequate "Health form" that we all fill out when we check in. No one checks these forms and what is the point? No one is going to risk being turned away so they lie about their coughing/diarrhea etc!  I have always thought this form was a joke.

Every one should be checked with the thermometer before being allowed into the check in line. Not just during this crisis but always.

 

Secondly, on board EVERYONE must wash their hands before entering the buffet or any other restaurant. Mandatory, not just expecting people to do the right thing. An officer should be stationed at every doorway to enforce it. The crew member with the sanitizer should not have to deal with uncooperative cruisers.

These two improvements will prevent a lot of the sickness on board cruise ships.

 

Maureen.

[ECCruise]

21 minutes ago, gmjc2 said:

Secondly, on board EVERYONE must wash their hands before entering the buffet or any other restaurant. Mandatory, not just expecting people to do the right thing. An officer should be stationed at every doorway to enforce it. The crew member with the sanitizer should not have to deal with uncooperative cruisers.

These two improvements will prevent a lot of the sickness on board cruise ships.

 

Maureen.

Saw this on Azamara Quest recently.  You either sanitized your hands or were denied entry to the buffet area.  And patrolled by someone with authority.  Watched them make people turn around and have to leave.

[gmjc2]

3 minutes ago, ECCruise said:

Saw this on Azamara Quest recently.  You either sanitized your hands or were denied entry to the buffet area.  And patrolled by someone with authority.  Watched them make people turn around and have to leave.

Good for them. It is just common sense to prevent Norovirus and anything else that might be going around.

[gmjc2]

ECCruise--- we were supposed to be arriving in NC. next week to take delivery of an RV and put it on site in a Sylva RV park--The RV park and all the hotels are closed so we can't travel and Southwest will not refund our money for the flight. Such ethical people!!!

 

Maureen.

[voljeep]

1 hour ago, gmjc2 said:

Good for them. It is just common sense to prevent Norovirus and anything else that might be going around.

and no excuse for we just washed our hands and just passing thru … sorry - pass thru somewhere else

[billco]

What Needs To Happen For Me To Regain Confidence In Cruising? - Simple for me. If the ships start sailing again, I'll have the confidence to cruise again.

[ECCruise]

16 minutes ago, voljeep said:

and no excuse for we just washed our hands and just passing thru … sorry - pass thru somewhere else

Hear it all the time and never believe it.  Sanitize or leave.  Pretty simple.

[bluesea321]

21 hours ago, BarbinMich said:

...Yes, it's true that two Princess ships (Grand, Diamond) had a few pax with COVID.  But Princess has 20+ ships.

 

Actually, there are 4 ships with confirmed COVID, the Diamond, the Grand, the Ruby and now the Coral.  And Princess has 18 ships so the ratio is nearly 25%.  

[dog]

I will cruise again. Have a FCC to use. A Princess cruise planner just called. Waste of time and effort. Princess needs to put people on their phones who know what their website says. 

Edited April 2, 2020 by dog

[voljeep]

1 minute ago, dog said:

I will cruise again. Have a FCC to use. A Princess cruise planner just called. Waste of time and effort. Princess needs to put pet on their phones who know what their website says. 

unfortunately, what we see on the Princess website may not be the same thing as Princess reps are seeing on their end … I've had to have the Princess rep actually log into the website to see what ( prices/promos ) I was seeing online

[dog]

So true. Way to run a business. 

[bluesea321]

On 4/1/2020 at 11:00 AM, Cruiseathoning said:

I love to cruise.  Wife and I both do.  Look at my userid!  But for the foreseeable future, if there is such a thing, we will not be.

 

There is a CC member by the username of Pescado Amarillo who has spent the last 10 winters on Princess ships so she obviously loves cruising and below is what she posted on a similar thread.  I agree with her (except the last point perhaps).

 

I will cruise on Princess again, if all of the criteria below occur:

• a COVID-19 vaccine is developed;
• the stock market recovers somewhat;
• Princess survives this;
• Princess returns to me all the cash (not FCC) they owe me; and
• Princess keeps some non-Royal Class ships in its fleet. 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2741398-will-you-book-another-cruise-on-princess/page/8/

 

Edited April 2, 2020 by bluesea321