CDC data shows 100% of cruise lines now have possible Covid cases… but could testing be relaxed?

June 26, 2021 is a fixed date for cruises. On this day a year ago, the first ship – Celebrity Edge – departed Port Everglades, marking the first cruise ship to depart from the United States since cruises ceased in March 2020.

And what started with a single ship has now grown to nearly 100 large ships sailing from 20 cruise lines. Today, millions of passengers are once again cruising from the United States, visiting everywhere from Alaska to Aruba and places in between.

During this time, the onboard experience has changed dramatically as the nation’s attitude towards the pandemic has relaxed, although cases still exist. In fact, the latest figures from the CDC show that every cruise ship the CDC tracks (94 ships in total) has probable cases on board.

Still, there are some early indications that pre-sailing testing rules – one of the hallmarks of last year’s return to cruise protocols – could be relaxed.

So what exactly is going on? Here’s the latest you need to know.

100% of ships tracked by CDC have possible cases

As part of the return to sailing a year ago, cruise lines did so under CDC oversight. These protocols set out a variety of rules for cruise ships to follow, from testing to isolating cases found on the ship.

Part of this program included reporting cases on the ship to the CDC on a daily basis. Then, The health authority has assigned a color status based on the number of cases on board . While the CDC’s program has since transitioned to volunteer services, all major cruise lines sailing in the United States have signed up.

Of course, this program does not make individual case counts available to the public. So we have no idea how many cases ships are actually dealing with. But the color status gives an indication of what ships are seeing.

According to the CDC, there are four different status levels:

at Cruzely, We’ve been tracking ships’ color status for months going back to August 2021. And right now, cruise lines are seeing the lowest number of ships with green status since we started tracking.

While the number of green ships has fluctuated in the single digits, as of the last report there was not a single ship with that status. As recently as mid-March, almost 60 ships were green.

Almost 90 ships now have orange status, meaning more than 0.3% of onboard ships sailing with passengers (three people per thousand) have cases. Note: Ships can also get the orange status if they don’t submit reports on time.

Overall, of the 94 vessels currently being tracked by the CDC, All are either yellow or orange, indicating possible cases at the moment:

Despite cases, restrictions are being eased

Nevertheless, the trend on cruise ships is towards easing restrictions. For example, mask rules on ships introduced during the Omicron wave were relaxed months ago. The rules mandating masks in terminals were also recently relaxed following a court ruling .

And minor changes – such as Reduced the number of passengers to be vaccinated from 95% to 90% for the cruise to be considered “heavily vaccinated” – were also made.

If you’re cruising from the United States today, the onboard experience is much the same as it was before the pandemic. The biggest difference is that in most cases, cruise lines require vaccination and a Covid test before going to the pier.

Signs of a relaxation of testing rules?

But could this test requirement be eliminated? There’s some evidence it could happen, although it’s far from a sure thing.

First, the CDC recently dropped a requirement for testing before flying into the United States. Previously, passengers – including US citizens – were required to have a negative test before flying to the US. This appears to be a clear sign that the health authority is moving towards less travel restrictions.

At the same time the agency also recently has removed its travel health notice for cruises . While in practice this means only minor changes for passengers on the ship, it is a sign that the agency’s restrictions on cruises may be eased.

Also, some cruise lines sailing outside the United States are waiving their pre-boarding testing requirements. According to CruiseIndustryNews.com , Two lines dropped some pre-boarding test rules.

P&O Cruises – part of Carnival Corporation – has said it will not require pre-boarding tests for some upcoming summer cruises aboard any of its ships. It’s a long way from a complete lifting of testing rules, but it’s a start.

Viking Cruises also said it was dropping pre-boarding testing rules for passengers, with the exception of Viking Orion and Viking Octantis sailing in the United States. According to his website , “Viking strongly recommends but does not require a pre-departure COVID-19 test unless the destination requires one.”

That decision came as a result of US regulation dropping testing requirements for flights, according to Viking chairman Torstein Hagan.

No attempt to drop US testing requirements yet

Certainly there are no definite signs that testing will end ahead of a cruise from the United States. But despite the high number of ships seeing cases, there is some evidence that the hiring is tending to further ease rather than tighten cruise restrictions.

Also remember that the cruise industry is one of the few parts of travel where things like testing and vaccination requirements are in place right now.

There seems little doubt that Covid is still having an impact on cruises and around the world. But as we learn to live with the virus, it seems clear that the trend is toward fewer restrictions and protocols. It could be that pre-boarding tests are the next relief.