Japan’s coronavirus cruise ships

61 people on a cruise ship off the coast of Japan have tested positive for the new coronavirus.

Japan’s government said on Monday it would quarantine a Yokohama-bound cruise ship, after a Hong Kong man who sailed on it last month tested positive for coronavirus. The 80-year-old man flew to Japan and boarded the ship, the Diamond Princess, in Yokohama on Jan. 20 and disembarked in Hong Kong on Jan. 25. On Jan 31 he was confirmed to have the virus.

The cruise ship had 2,666 guests and 1,045 crew on board from 56 countries. The ship is currently docked at Yokohama Port, near Tokyo. The tour company said around half the guests are from Japan. It also said it was providing satellite TV, films, newspapers, room service, and free phone calls and internet to all guests.

"Today they will be sent to hospitals in several prefectures, and we are now preparing for that." Japan's Health Minister Katsunobu Kato said. Twenty passengers diagnosed earlier have already been taken to hospitals.

The 61 confirmed patients are from:

• Japan: 28 people
• US: 11
• Australia, Canada: 7
• China: 3
• UK, New Zealand, Taiwan, Philippines, Argentina: 1

With the quarantine due to last until 19 February, there has also been concern over supplies of normal medicine to the ship. The latest on that issue is that one passenger had been seen waving a Japanese flag with the message "shortage of medicine" and a Japanese TV crew on the shore responded with a banner asking "What medicine?"

Japan previously had 20 confirmed coronavirus cases, of these 17 people have been in Wuhan, the central Chinese city that is believed to be the centre of the virus outbreak. The new cases from the Diamond Princess bring Japan's number of confirmed cases up to 86, the second highest figure after China.

A separate cruise ship, the World Dream, has been quarantined in Hong Kong after eight former passengers, who had been on board from 19 to 24 January, tested positive for the virus. The ship was on route to Taiwan when it was discovered and had to cancel, returning to Hong Kong where it has been since. It has around 3,600 people on board, but none have tested positive so far. All crew that worked in the cabins of the infected passengers have been isolated, with no new cases of the virus reported.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced Thursday that Japan will deny entry of foreign passengers on another cruise ship — Holland America’s cruise ship Westerdam, on its way to Okinawa from Hong Kong — because of suspected virus patients found on board. The Seattle-based operator denied anyone had virus. Abe said the new immigration policy takes effect Friday to ensure border control to prevent the disease from entering and spreading further into Japan.

The ship with more than 2,000 people was currently near Ishigaki, one of Okinawa’s outer islands, and was seeking another port, said Overseas Travel Agency official Mie Matsubara. “Everyone is starting to reject the ship and we are getting desperate,” she said. “We hope we can go somewhere so that passengers can land.”

At least four other cruise ships, two foreign and two Japanese-operated, are headed to Japan by the end of the month, Transport Minister Kazuyoshi Akaba said, urging port authorities around the country to turn them away.

Sources (BBC, REUTERS, AP)