Passengers To Evacuate Cruise Ship After More Than Half Test Positive For Coronavirus

Topline: Passengers on an Australian cruiseliner are being evacuated with nearly 60% having tested positive for coronavirus since the ship embarked on a trip March 15, well after alarms about the coronavirus pandemic were sounded.

• Aurora Expeditions, an Australian cruise operator, announced this week that of the 217 people tested onboard the The Greg Mortimer cruiseliner, 128 have tested positive for coronavirus.
• Originally meant to go through Antarctica and the South Georgia Islands, the ship has been stuck off the coast of Uruguay since early April, when authorities would not let passengers disembark out of coronavirus fears.
• Australian and New Zealand passengers will be evacuated this week on a chartered flight, according to Aurora, while American and European guests will have to wait until they receive a negative coronavirus test before they can leave the ship and return home via Brazil.
• Six passengers who needed special care have been transferred to Montevideo, Uruguay medical facilities, as shown by a video posted by the Uruguayan navy. 
• All of the confirmed cases on board are asymptomatic and fever-free, Aurora is claiming.

Key background: The Greg Mortimer has joined more than a dozen cruise ships trapped at sea as ports refuse to let passengers with confirmed coronavirus cases dock, according to CNN. Several days before the Aurora Expeditions cruise took off, The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared coronavirus a global pandemic, and fellow cruiseliners Princess Cruises and Viking Cruises announced they were suspending operations because of the coronavirus. The U.S. State Department advised Americans against traveling on cruise ships on March 8. 

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