THE German cruise line Aida has suspended all of its passenger ship cruises in response to “massive restrictions” due to the coronavirus outbreak.
Aida also operates the AIDAmira cruise ship that called at the port of Lüderitz on 11 March and at Walvis Bay on Thursday with 1 629 passengers on board.
The company made the announcement in a media statement today.
“Due to the increasing number of cases of Covid-19, there are massive restrictions in the countries we call at worldwide. The respective measures taken in the regions are issued at very short notice,”the company stated.
"We therefore very much regret to announce today that due to these circumstances we will temporarily suspend the Aida travel season until the beginning of April 2020,” the company said.
The AIDAmira operates between the ports of Durban, East London, Port Elizabeth and Cape Town in South Africa and the ports of Lüderitz and Walvis Bay in Namibia.
The vessel has left Namibia and is en route to Cape Town, where its passengers will disembark.
It was expected to return to Namibia for three days from 25 to 27 March and again from 9 to 10 April.
The Ministry of Health and Social Services also issued a media statement today in which it confirmed that all of the passengers on the AIDAmira had been screened at the port of Lüderitz before they disembarked. However, no testing was done at the port of Walvis Bay on Thursday.
“All passengers on the vessel were screened before they set foot on Namibian soil. None of them had a temperature reading of above 38 degrees Celcius. Their temperatures were taken before being allowed to proceed to immigration formalities.
“The vessel later proceeded to Walvis Bay where it arrived on the morning of 12 March 2020. Since all passengers had already been screened at Lüderitz, no screening was deemed necessary at Walvis Bay Port,” said Veronica Haludilu, district environmental practitioner assigned to port health at Lüderitz.
Namport’s acting chief executive officer, Kavin Harry, said at a media briefing on Friday that the ports authority cannot take over a vessel before it has been cleared by the health ministry.
“All international foreign vessels calling at the port of Walvis Bay are required to forward shipping pages to Namport, to the Department of Maritime Affairs and the ministry of health. They also have to present a list of the last ten ports, should that list include countries that are affected with coronavirus additional information needs to be forwarded which include crew list, vaccination list, port clearance certificates amongst others,” said Harry.
Health screenings are mandatory at Namibian points of entry, and a health declaration is required to be completed upon arrival.
No cases of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) have at this stage been confirmed in Namibia.
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