More than 20 Diamond Princess passengers went ashore without checking coronavirus

More than 20 passengers of the Diamond Princess cruise liner have went ashore without checking coronavirus after a two -week quarantine, the Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare of Japan Katsunobo Kato said. According to him, at least 23 people did not pass the audit: 19 Japan citizens and four foreigners. The authorities contacted them so that they were tested.

“This is our mistake, we regret it deeply and hope that this will not happen again,” Kato TASS quotes. From February 19 to February 21, about 970 people out of 3.7 thousand passengers and crew members left Diamond Princess. In a separate manner, citizens of the USA, South Korea, Australia, Israel, Canada and Hong Kong were evacuated using charter flights.

About 1.2 thousand people remain on the liner - the crew and those who are in contact with the infected ones. The Japanese authorities intend to lower them ashore in the near future. Captain Liner, Italian Jennaro Arma, will leave the side last. About a hundred passengers who were closely in contact with the patients were sent by buses for two -week quarantine in the vicinity of Tokyo, Interfax reports with reference to the Japanese media.

Diamond Princess became the second largest foci of coronavirus spread outside China, 634 people were infected on board, including three Russians. Two passengers, citizens of Japan 87 and 84 years old, died in the hospital.

Among the likely causes of mass infection of passengers in quarantine are not a strict sanitary-epidemiological regime, air filtration system, the connection of the cabin and the method of waste export. It is still unclear how exactly the infection of people on the ship took place. Perhaps healthy people were infected through the door handles. According to Business Insider , on April 29, after complete disinfection, Diamond Princess will begin to perform cruises in normal mode.