Coronavirus quarantine traps Paso Robles woman on cruise ship for 2 weeks
Sarah Arana was on the last day of her very first cruise when her itinerary along the coast of Japan and Southeast Asia took a sudden turn.
A passenger tested positive for coronavirus, and her two weeks aboard the ship were about to become four as it was placed under quarantine.
Now, the medical social worker from Paso Robles is one of more than 2,600 passengers and 1,000 crew stuck in their rooms while the ship sits in port in Yokohama, Japan.
The quarantine was ordered on Feb. 4 after a passenger aboard the Diamond Princess cruise liner — which had taken travelers on a two-week trip from Yokohama, Japan, to Hong Kong, Vietnam, Taiwan and back — tested positive for coronavirus, a new disease that’s caused a worldwide epidemic.
The Hong Kong passenger sailed on the ship for five days before returning home and testing positive for the virus, according to Princess Cruises.
Seven days later, the ship is home to the largest number of coronavirus cases outside China — 135 passengers, 20 of whom are Americans, have tested positive for the disease, as of Monday, according to a New York Times story.
“This is unprecedented,” Arana told The Tribune via Facebook message, when asked how passengers have been treated. “No one was prepared for this. It’s been hard to get essential meds and other critical needs met in a timely manner. Otherwise, they’re doing the best they can.”
‘A floating, mini-version of Wuhan, China’
The quarantine has created what the Times called “a floating, mini-version of Wuhan, China,” the province where the virus originated and whose 11 million residents are under a similar lockdown.
While the order keeps potentially infected people in one place, some experts told the newspaper that restricting so many to such close quarters puts them more at risk of transmitting the disease.
“Similar to the situation in Wuhan, but at a smaller scale, by quarantining the ship, the crew members are being forced to stay together, which increases the likelihood of transmission,” John B. Lynch, an associate professor of infectious diseases at the University of Washington, told the Times. “We have to remember that quarantines protect those outside the quarantine, not those within.”
Crew members who spoke to the Times anonymously said they had been given masks, gloves and hand sanitizer, and on Monday, passengers received new, higher-quality masks to better filter air particles.
The question of how many people might actually be infected on the ship remains unknown, however.
The Japanese Health Ministry had only tested 439 people from the ship as of Monday, according to the Times, and said it did not have the capacity to test the more than 3,000 who remain untested.
Life in quarantine
Arana has remained healthy and upbeat. She has been documenting her quarantine on her Facebook page and has been interviewed by international media organizations, including the Times, Time Magazine and Australian news outlets.
She’s one of the lucky passengers — although she’s confined to her room, she has a balcony and access to fresh air and sunlight.
Groups of passengers have been allowed on deck for periods of time, but they aren’t allowed to congregate and must wear masks, Arana wrote in one update.
Passengers are also required to take their temperature multiple times per day, and those with results that are too high must notify officials
In her most recent post, Arana described sleeping outside to avoid chemicals the crew likely used to clean the ship’s air ducts.
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“I slept out on my balcony under the stars last night,” she wrote. “I could smell chemicals, and my eyes and throat were burning as I suspect they treated the air ducts, so I had my own little ‘camp out.’”
The ship has been docked at Yokohama for much of the last week, with periodic trips out to sea. Arana has occupied herself by reading, watching movies and drinking plenty of tea.
Her Facebook posts describe a private group passengers have created to stay in touch during this period of isolation.
“We are sharing jokes, laughing and making the best of this situation,” Arana wrote on Saturday. “Meanwhile, we are still communicating with several that tested positive in their new quarantine locations. They report the Japanese are taking this very seriously. They are isolated but well cared for, and they are all feeling fine.”
Arana has remained positive throughout the ordeal. She isn’t concerned about contracting the virus, and she encourages others not to panic and to educate themselves about the situation.
“I am not worried about getting sick,” Arana told The Tribune. “If I do, I will deal with it. I’m not in a high-risk category and I feel confident that the majority of cases have been mild with a full recovery.”
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What is the coronavirus?
The World Health Organization on Tuesday distinguished the virus, known as “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2” or “SARS-CoV-2” from the disease it causes, “covid-19,” according to the Washington Post.
Those who contract the disease — which was originally detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China — exhibit respiratory illness-like symptoms, including fever, cough and shortness of breath, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The CDC recommends avoiding all nonessential travel to China, and foreign nationals who’ve visited the country in the past 14 days are currently not allowed to enter the United States.
More than 1,000 people have died from the illness — mostly in China, according to the Washington Post.
However, most San Luis Obispo County residents are more likely to contract the flu than the coronavirus, according to Penny Borenstein, county health officer.
“Currently, it appears that the 2019-nCoV illness is neither particularly deadly (perhaps akin to the flu), nor can each case spread to many others, especially if not living in crowded conditions,” Borenstein wrote in a Friday Tribune viewpoint.
This story was originally published February 11, 2020 at 2:21 PM with the headline "Coronavirus quarantine traps Paso Robles woman on cruise ship for 2 weeks."
