The Government of Japan has confirmed the death of two passengers of the Diamond Princess, the cruise ship quarantined with more than 3,700 people on board for two weeks in the Japanese port of Yokohama, after a case of Covid-19 was detected in the boat These are two Japanese citizens, a man and a woman of 87 and 84 years, respectively, who contracted the new coronavirus on board.
Both were taken to hospitals on February 11 and 12, and both suffered from underlying diseases, according to the Japanese television network NHK. They are the first fatalities of the ship, in which more than 620 people have been infected, the Japanese Ministry of Health reported Thursday. With them there are three deaths in Japan because of the coronavirus.
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The Diamond Princess is anchored in the port of Yokohama for two weeks. The finding of a case of coronavirus inside the ship, a passenger who had gotten off in Hong Kong on February 1, made the Japanese authorities decide to keep on board - isolated in their cabins, except for exceptional departures on deck - to 3,771 occupants , between passengers and crew, during a quarantine of two weeks.
During this period, at least 620 people have also been infected, after 79 more infections were reported on Wednesday. Despite the new cases, the Japanese authorities respected the end of the quarantine, scheduled for February 19, and since Wednesday hundreds of passengers have proceeded to disembark. The operation, which will be delayed until Friday, only allows those who have been negative in the virus and have no symptoms to leave the ship; Meanwhile, passengers who have shared a cabin with infected people must stay on the ship until further notice.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Health, the 2666 passengers, not the 1105 crew, have undergone the new coronavirus detection test. The cruise operator will decide when the crew that has not been infected can leave the ship.
Although the Japanese authorities defend their management of the Diamond Princess, criticisms about it increase. A day before the landings began, a Japanese infection specialist entered the ship and later described the scene, in a video posted on YouTube, as "completely chaotic." In it, Dr. Kentaro Iwata, of the Kobe University Hospital, criticizes the poor protocol of prevention of contagion on the ship and prevents passengers who have landed - some examined two weeks ago - may still have contracted the disease afterwards: “ I would not be surprised if they spread it to others, ”he warns.
New change in diagnostic criteria in Hubei
The National Health Commission of China reported on Thursday the lowest number of new cases of coronavirus since January 23, when Wuhan, the epicenter of the epidemic, was blocked. In total, it reported 349 new infections in the last 24 hours, a drastic decrease compared to the 1,693 cases recorded the previous day.
The decline is due to a new change of criteria in the diagnosis in Hubei, province of which Wuhan is the capital. While a week ago the provincial authorities added as infected patients who presented signs of pneumonia in examinations of scanners by tomography - which caused that in a single day the cases multiplied by 10 -, this Wednesday they returned to the initial criterion. This only includes as infected those who test positive for a nucleic acid.
In total, the number of infections is 74,675. The fatalities amount to 2,121, 115 more than Wednesday. Up to 16,192 people have been cured so far.
