New Covid protocol. How did it go?

[Love2cruisewkids]

We are sailing with unvacinated 9 year old twins in October. My understanding is that one of the testing options is an at home Covid test and we just need to show the negative test in picture form. My husband and I are both vacinated so we just bring our vax cards. Any comments or experience with how this all goes when checking in would be appreciated. 

[HaveWeMetYet]

1 hour ago, Love2cruisewkids said:

We are sailing with unvacinated 9 year old twins in October. My understanding is that one of the testing options is an at home Covid test and we just need to show the negative test in picture form. My husband and I are both vacinated so we just bring our vax cards. Any comments or experience with how this all goes when checking in would be appreciated. 

If you indicate you are vax on the health form they never ask for any proof. Probably they check it out with CDC and you get flagged if you put down you are vaxxed but they could not find a record. Never hurts to have your vax card.

Unvaxxed. Just show a picture of a negative test. Your test,  anyones test, a fake test, it does not matter.

[Tree_skier]

2 hours ago, Love2cruisewkids said:

We are sailing with unvacinated 9 year old twins in October. My understanding is that one of the testing options is an at home Covid test and we just need to show the negative test in picture form. My husband and I are both vacinated so we just bring our vax cards. Any comments or experience with how this all goes when checking in would be appreciated. 

We just did this with our teenage unvaccinated grand kids on Monday when we boarded Navigator.  When you check in online with app at 30 or 45 days (I can't remember which) you list the vax status for each person on the reservation.  Upon arrival at the terminal they ask to to see the test for the unvaxxed. We showed pictures on our phone of each grand child's test. The picture was given a cursory glance and they moved on to the next step in the process.  They didn't check the date of the pic and they didn't care that there was no proof that the test was actually taken by my gs or gd.  I had the actual lollipop test in my electronics back just in case they wanted to see the original.  It was unnecessary. 

 

It was a simple and painless process

 

Enjoy your cruise!

Edited September 17, 2022 by Tree_skier

[JKenn2]

18 minutes ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

If you indicate you are vax on the health form they never ask for any proof. Probably they check it out with CDC and you get flagged if you put down you are vaxxed but they could not find a record. Never hurts to have your vax card.

Unvaxxed. Just show a picture of a negative test. Your test,  anyones test, a fake test, it does not matter.

I think it does matter!  Why wouldn't you want to know if you negative or positive for sure??   So you don't bother to take a covid test and show a fake test. Turns out your kid is positive, once you're on the ship. We know the result of that, you get quarantined to your room for a good part of your vacation. Not to mention possibly infecting other passengers, who in turn get quarantined to their room too.  I think that is irresponsible advice!

[publicpersona]

1 hour ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

If you indicate you are vax on the health form they never ask for any proof. Probably they check it out with CDC and you get flagged if you put down you are vaxxed but they could not find a record.

 

The CDC does not have any record of your being vaccinated or not. They do track vaccinations by various demographics, but do not have any record that is associated with someone's personally identifiable information.

 

At least they aren't supposed to. (Let's not theorize here)

[BirdTravels]

2 hours ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

Unvaxxed. Just show a picture of a negative test. Your test,  anyones test, a fake test, it does not matter.

I thought that Royal (and other cruise lines) used to have some admonishment about faking tests. They still have admonishments about faking vaccinations.

 

Falsifying documentation of vaccination may lead to criminal prosecution in various jurisdictions. We reserve the right to remove from the ship any guest whom has submitted a falsified vaccination document to local authorities. We further reserve the right to bring a civil action against any guest who falsely attests to their vaccination status to recover all costs and damages caused by such fraudulent conduct. 

[rudeney]

1 hour ago, BirdTravels said:

I thought that Royal (and other cruise lines) used to have some admonishment about faking tests. They still have admonishments about faking vaccinations.

 

Falsifying documentation of vaccination may lead to criminal prosecution in various jurisdictions. We reserve the right to remove from the ship any guest whom has submitted a falsified vaccination document to local authorities. We further reserve the right to bring a civil action against any guest who falsely attests to their vaccination status to recover all costs and damages caused by such fraudulent conduct. 

 

Actually, they have to go to binding arbitration, per their own rules.  But if they were to file in civil court, it would then open RCCL to civil court filings by the affected passengers.  Bottom line: they won't pursue this. 

[Keksie]

11 hours ago, JKenn2 said:

I think it does matter!  Why wouldn't you want to know if you negative or positive for sure??   So you don't bother to take a covid test and show a fake test. Turns out your kid is positive, once you're on the ship. We know the result of that, you get quarantined to your room for a good part of your vacation. Not to mention possibly infecting other passengers, who in turn get quarantined to their room too.  I think that is irresponsible advice!

If it mattered the cruise line would still require a proctored test.

[not-enough-cruising]

12 hours ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

If you indicate you are vax on the health form they never ask for any proof. Probably they check it out with CDC and you get flagged if you put down you are vaxxed but they could not find a record. Never hurts to have your vax card.

Unvaxxed. Just show a picture of a negative test. Your test,  anyones test, a fake test, it does not matter.

The CDC has no record of your vaccination status. 

[HicksRA]

Obviously Royal doesn’t really care if you have a valid test result or not or they wouldn’t make it so lax. 
I believe it’s just window dressing for the CDC. 

[taglovestocruise]

15 hours ago, JKenn2 said:

I think it does matter!  Why wouldn't you want to know if you negative or positive for sure??   So you don't bother to take a covid test and show a fake test. Turns out your kid is positive, once you're on the ship. We know the result of that, you get quarantined to your room for a good part of your vacation. Not to mention possibly infecting other passengers, who in turn get quarantined to their room too.  I think that is irresponsible advice!

Do you really think very many people would turn themselves into medical.  I can not imagine myself every being sick enough to make a trip to medical. 

[Keksie]

3 minutes ago, taglovestocruise said:

Do you really think very many people would turn themselves into medical.  I can not imagine myself every being sick enough to make a trip to medical. 

Maybe for a heart attack or stroke.  Otherwise, I travel with enough OTC meds to take care of most problems.

[Love2cruisewkids]

Thank you for all the first hand experineces. My kids will take the test (no fake here). I want to know if they are sick....no fun with 2 sick 9 years olds. We will all do a home test prior to leaving for the ship to be sure. 

[rudeney]

9 hours ago, taglovestocruise said:

Do you really think very many people would turn themselves into medical.  I can not imagine myself every being sick enough to make a trip to medical. 

 

Our daughter visited medical once and the last day of our cruise.  She had a raging sinus infection and was sure they would give her something stronger than OTCs.  Nope.  Gave her Dayquil and charged us $200 (insurance reimbursed us).  Never again!  

[ShazM]

11 hours ago, HicksRA said:

Obviously Royal doesn’t really care if you have a valid test result or not or they wouldn’t make it so lax. 
I believe it’s just window dressing for the CDC. 

It isn't lax for the transpacific we are getting on in 3 weeks. All tests must be supervised, no at home unsupervised tests or relying on honesty for this one. All of us travelling received an email 2 days ago and they decided to add something else. That is that everyone over 5 must be fully vaccinated. There are some families doing this trip with 6 and 7 year olds that aren't vaccinated and they decide to add this 3 weeks out when there is no chance of it being done now. Plenty of people are trying to get this clarified.

 

One lady has 3 emails from Royal, even as late as last week, stating her 6 year old didn't require vaccination and now they have changed it. She called them yesterday and they told her it would be OK as long as the child had a negative supervised test and yet the official email for this cruise states it must be done. One side doesn't appear to know what the other is doing or saying. 

[Love2cruisewkids]

Is this for international travel? We havent gotten any changes in testing requirement for the Western Caribbean.

 

[BND]

On 9/17/2022 at 10:12 PM, rudeney said:

 

Our daughter visited medical once and the last day of our cruise.  She had a raging sinus infection and was sure they would give her something stronger than OTCs.  Nope.  Gave her Dayquil and charged us $200 (insurance reimbursed us).  Never again!  

I had a sinus infection for almost two weeks (during and after our spring cruise).  I went to urgent care the day after we got home with 101.5 temperature and lots of congestion, coughing, etc.  Protocol is not to give antibiotics until at least 10 days of symptoms (I was at 7 at that point) because the vast majority clear up on their own which mine did.  BTW, I was neg for flu and Covid (PCR and rapid). They told me to use OTC's and flonase.  So, what they did is standard practice now.  Antibiotics are over prescribed and over used.

Edited September 23, 2022 by BND

[moposh]

On 9/17/2022 at 12:34 PM, taglovestocruise said:

Do you really think very many people would turn themselves into medical.  I can not imagine myself every being sick enough to make a trip to medical. 

My daughter stubbed her toe.  I had bandaids but she wouldn't listen and went off to get help.  She eventually made her way to Medical and of course, they couldn't treat her without my permission.  They called me and I basically told them no.  Eventually I went down to Medical (we had just docked in Bermuda!  I wanted to enjoy!).  My daughter eventually decided not to be seen.  They had cleaned her toe and gave us some bandaids.  I tried to explain to her that Medical is expensive and not covered by insurance and I bring stuff to handle most emergencies.  I'd never been to Medical before on all my cruises.  Hopefully we will not have to return.

[BND]

1 hour ago, moposh said:

My daughter stubbed her toe.  I had bandaids but she wouldn't listen and went off to get help.  She eventually made her way to Medical and of course, they couldn't treat her without my permission.  They called me and I basically told them no.  Eventually I went down to Medical (we had just docked in Bermuda!  I wanted to enjoy!).  My daughter eventually decided not to be seen.  They had cleaned her toe and gave us some bandaids.  I tried to explain to her that Medical is expensive and not covered by insurance and I bring stuff to handle most emergencies.  I'd never been to Medical before on all my cruises.  Hopefully we will not have to return.

It's not that it's not covered by insurance but they don't accept insurance.  You have to file yourself with your own insurance company and depending on your policy, they may not pay or it will just go towards a deductible as it's out of network.  Also, for injuries that happen on board or on sponsored excursions, they usually treat at no cost.

[moposh]

4 minutes ago, BND said:

It's not that it's not covered by insurance but they don't accept insurance.  You have to file yourself with your own insurance company and depending on your policy, they may not pay or it will just go towards a deductible as it's out of network.  Also, for injuries that happen on board or on sponsored excursions, they usually treat at no cost.

I just try to stay away as I've heard it's expensive.  I did get injured on an excursion and they called and checked on me and sent me ice, which was very nice.  Our goal for our next cruise is no injuries!  🙂

[rudeney]

1 hour ago, BND said:

I had a sinus infection for almost two weeks (during and after our spring cruise).  I went to urgent care the day after we got home with 101.5 temperature and lots of congestion, coughing, etc.  Protocol is not to give antibiotics until at least 10 days of symptoms (I was at 7 at that point) because the vast majority clear up on their own which mine did.  BTW, I was neg for flu and Covid (PCR and rapid). They told me to use OTC's and flonase.  So, what they did is standard practice now.  Antibiotics are over prescribed and over used.

 

I agree about not overusing antibiotics, but there are times when it's obviously not viral.  A painful sinus infection with bright phlegm is 99% of the time bacterial.  That's what my daughter had when she went to medical on the ship, and it was confirmed when we returned home and she was treated by our PC doc.  

[BermudaBound2014]

On 9/16/2022 at 8:21 PM, HaveWeMetYet said:

Probably they check it out with CDC and you get flagged if you put down you are vaxxed but they could not find a record.

 

RCL is not checking with the CDC for a whole array or reasons.

[trouble1964]

On 9/23/2022 at 2:55 PM, moposh said:

I just try to stay away as I've heard it's expensive.  I did get injured on an excursion and they called and checked on me and sent me ice, which was very nice.  Our goal for our next cruise is no injuries!  🙂

DH and I have both been, once each. He is claustrophobic and fainted at the lifeboat drill (no option on going that time----they whisked him into a wheelchair and practically ran him to medical, and myself for an anaphylactic reaction to who knows what). DH got the full cardiac checkout, and I got pumped full of all kinds of meds. The doctor in my situation actually called my regular MD and they discussed if a new medication could have caused the reaction. In both cases, our health insurance reimbursed the majority, and travel insurance picked up the rest of the cost----each was around $500. Much cheaper than an ER visit!