Dozens of people have come down with illness on a P&O Cruises ship that recently docked in New York.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention boarded the vessel and confirmed at least 65 cruise guests and ten crew members reported gastrointestinal symptoms, including vomiting and diarrhea.
CDC Reports at Least 75 with Symptoms
However, the CDC hasn’t yet confirmed the cause as norovirus. The P&O Arcadia, carrying 1,959 passengers, is on a transatlantic voyage from Southampton, UK to the US and Canada.
The health agency said a field response is ongoing “for an environmental assessment and outbreak investigation to assist the ship in controlling the outbreak.”
“All guests were provided with an advisory notice with precautionary health measures for onboard and onshore, as is standard procedure,” a P&O Cruises spokesperson told USA TODAY. “P&O Cruises swiftly implemented enhanced sanitization protocols onboard.”
The cruise line additionally announced the outbreak to passengers and crew “to encourage case reporting and good hand hygiene,” the CDC said.
So far, in 2024, the CDC has reported a dozen illness outbreaks, nine of which were confirmed to be caused by norovirus.
Norovirus is spread mostly through direct contact, initially through food, water, or contaminated surfaces.
The agency says there are about 2,500 reported norovirus outbreaks in the US annually, with cruise ship outbreaks only accounting for about 1%.
Under the CDC’s Vessel Sanitation Program, it monitors ongoing outbreaks, provides training and inspects ships’ sanitation standards.
Recently, P&O Cruises was criticized for its less-than-transparent reporting of a previous outbreak earlier this summer. The outbreak occurred during a two-week cruise in May aboard the P&O Ventura ship.
At the time, P&O Cruises reported that only 0.64% of passengers and crew fell ill with norovirus symptoms. However, weeks later, a freedom of information request found that 519 cases of illness were reported, representing more than 12% of ship passengers and crew.
The cruise line explained it released data for only those “currently symptomatic and represented the efficacy of our protocols as numbers had declined significantly.”
