My friend DeltaPoints emailed a video clip today. It seems the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identified the culprit behind the Norovirus outbreak aboard Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas last week as the GIII.4 Sydney strain.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0o-PPzKGo80
Interesting name for a virus, but even more interesting to me was an ABCNews.com article quoting the CDC virologist who tested the samples from Explorer of the Seas.
“The norovirus is a very democratic virus –- it affects everybody,” said Jan Vinje, the head virologist who tested the Royal Caribbean germ samples in the CDC’s lab. “If we look at the land outbreaks, the cruise ships make up less than 1 percent [of the cases].” (bold emphasis mine)
I’ve always known the media hype was overblown when it came to Noro and cruising, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen someone outside the industry say it too. When it comes to cruising, I’ll keep following my own advice….and look forward to enjoying my next cruise.
-MJ, February 7, 2014
I’m thinking, since only .2% of the population takes a cruise every year and the percent of noro cases on cruise ships is ~1%, that alone means cruise ships contribute about 5x cases. Also, for people who do take cruises, the percentage of time they are on the ship is only a fraction of a year compared to the time they are on land. So I’m thinking an individuals chance of getting noro is greatly increased on a ship.
I think what makes people nervous is the lack of control – on a ship you are stuck in a small space and you can’t prepare your own food. If there is an outbreak all you can do is try a be extra clean yourself, but don’t have control over what happens in the kitchen or the cleanliness of the people in the space before you.