Posted on 11/16/2006 2:01:34 PM PST by quidnunc
By the time Carnival Cruise Lines' Liberty pulls into Port Everglades this weekend from a transatlantic voyage, more than 700 people on board will have been afflicted with a highly contagious, stomach flu-like illness that appears to be norovirus, the cruise line said Wednesday.
The outbreak could be the largest reported in recent years by the cruise industry.
"It's impossible for now to say what the source is," said David Forney, chief of the cruise ship sanitation program at the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He said it's likely passengers brought the virus with them when they boarded and it spread from there, but U.S. inspectors will look at whether food or water contributed to the outbreak.
The cruise industry, which is required to report the illnesses to the CDC, records dozens of viral outbreaks annually, with most affecting fewer than 100 people.
While often publicized, the cruise ship outbreaks are far less common than they seem, affecting about one in every 3,600 cruise ship passengers, said Christine Fischer, spokeswoman for the International Council of Cruise Lines, an industry lobbying group.
"Your chances of actually contracting norovirus are much higher on land than on a cruise," she said.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at sun-sentinel.com ...
Carnival's idea of fun ships, apparently, is for everyone to get drunk, loud and stoopid. Oh yeah, and bring a bunch of brat kids and don't bother supervising them.
Glad to hear! That's the first I have heard of it!
I still wouldn't take a cruise. I don't care for the water and I would rather get where I am going. Just not my thing.
Well I have been fortunate enough to have taken two cruises, 1 Royal caribbean Caribbean cruise, a Cunard Alaskan cruise, and a 2 week private safari in Kenya.
If I had to rank the three from best to last:
1:Kenya, i'll never forget it
2:Alaska cruise, amazing, but I was on a small 500 luxury passenger liner. Not a 5000 passenger hamburger and fries serving monster.
3. Caribbean cruise. Fun, but not really special.
LOL! True tagline. Call it the revised Shahada.
You could give me the free month cruise and $100,000.00 and I wouldn't hop on one of those disgusting germ factories.
A Naughty Nurse could inject me with anything, for all I care...
About 2 years ago we were on a cruise through the western
Mediterranean aboard a Princess liner. At dinner we noticed an elderly
lady sitting alone along the rail of the grand stairway in the main dining
room. I also noticed that all the staff, ships officers, waiters, busboys,
etc., all seemed very familiar with this lady. I asked our waiter whom the
lady was expecting to be told she owned the line, but he said he only knew
that she had been on board for the last four cruises, back to back.
As we left the dining room one evening I caught her eye and stopped to
say hello. We chatted and I said, "I understand you've been on this ship
for the last four cruises". She replied, "Yes, that's true." I stated, "I
don't understand?"
She replied without a pause, "It's cheaper than a nursing home".
Here's the proof -- when I get old and feeble, I am going to get on a
Princess Cruise Ship.
The average cost for a nursing home is $200 per day. I have checked on
reservations at Princess and I can get a long term discount and senior
discount price of $135 per day. That leaves $65 a day for:
1. Gratuities which will only be $10 per day.
2. I will have as many as 10 meals a day if I can waddle to the
restaurant, or I can have room service (which means I can have breakfast in bed
every day of the week).
3. Princess has as many as three swimming pools, a workout room, free
washers and dryers, and shows every night.
4. They have free toothpaste and razors, and free soap and shampoo.
5. They will even treat you like a customer, not a patient. An extra $5
worth of tips will have the entire staff scrambling to help you.
6. I will get to meet new people every 7 or 14 days.
7. TV broken? Light bulb need changing? Need to have the mattress
replaced? No Problem! They will fix everything and apologize for your
inconvenience.
8. Clean sheets and towels every day, and you don't even have to ask for them.
9. If you fall in the nursing home and break a hip you are on Medicare.
If you fall and break a hip on the Princess ship they will upgrade you to a
suite for the rest of your life.
Now hold on for the best! Do you want to see South America, the Panama
Canal, Tahiti, Australia, New Zealand, Asia, or name where you want to go?
Princess will have a ship ready to go. So don't look for me in a nursing
home, just call shore to ship.
P. S. And don't forget, when you die, they just dump you over the side at
no charge.
You forgot rogue waves.
Hey, I got reply 50 at last!
Kind of off topic,
but a Google image search
on the phrase passed out
returns some of my
favorite images. They
are so real-world sweet . . .
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