Traces of the CCP virus were found on a cruise ship in Japan over two weeks after passengers disembarked, according to Japanese researchers.
The Diamond Princess cruise ship was quarantined in Yokohama for two weeks starting in early February before all passengers and crew eventually got off.
Traces of the new virus were found “on a variety of surfaces” in cabins of infected passengers up to 17 days after the cabins were vacated, Takuya Yamagishi of Japan’s National Institute of Infectious Diseases told U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) researchers.
The traces were found in cabins of both symptomatic and asymptomatic infected passengers before the cabins were disinfected.
At the time of the quarantine, the cluster of cases on the Diamond Princess was the largest in the world outside of China. Seven hundred and twelve people on board ultimately became infected, with seven of them dying, according to the World Health Organization. Some passengers were repatriated to countries including the United States and became sick after leaving Japan.
According to the CDC, approximately 46.5 percent of the people on board who tested positive for COVID-19 were asymptomatic at the time of testing. “Available statistical models of the Diamond Princess outbreak suggest that 17.9% of infected persons never developed symptoms,” researchers stated.
Researchers recommended that all persons around the world defer travel on cruise ships during the pandemic.
Dr. Tara Smith, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the Kent State University College of Public Health, noted that researchers didn’t report on how many of the people who didn’t show symptoms eventually developed symptoms.
Smith also argued that the study does not show that the new virus can live on surfaces for 17 days, making the distinction between viral RNA and live virus.