– I would never be allowed to sail. I saw with astonishment that Norway started cruise traffic, says Eilif Dahl. He is a retired medical professor and cruise doctor, and one of Norway’s leading experts on cruise medicine. He was summoned as a witness in the trial which is now ongoing in Nord-Trom district court against a captain and a Norwegian doctor. They were fined after the extensive corona outbreak on the MS “Roald Amundsen” in the summer of 2020, but refused to pay. news has previously told how Hurtigruten lobbied to get a sailing license in the middle of the pandemic. Eilif Dahl says that on medical grounds he would never have allowed such a voyage. Especially because the whole world witnessed how things went on the cruise ship “Diamond Princess” in February that year. The cruise ship was placed in quarantine in Japan when a former passenger was found to be infected, and ended up with at least 700 being infected. Also then, as in Norway, the flow of patients overwhelmed local health authorities. And at the same time, the American authorities had a sailing refusal for cruise ships. The doctor’s defense attorney, Per Zimmer, believes his client should not be responsible for the court here. This responsibility is much higher than his competence and job description, he says. Photo: Lisa Rypeng / news No information about covid-19 Eilif Dahl criticizes the infection prevention guide that was created for cruise ships along the Norwegian coast, because it is not possible to sail without developing cold symptoms. And because it is impossible to distinguish between such symptoms and covid-19 infection. The court case concerns whether the captain and the doctor should have notified the Norwegian authorities of a possible outbreak of infection. Eilif Dahl believes that the doctors on board did everything right, and thus that it was right for the captain not to notify about the infection. – He was clear that none of the doctors had information that there was a covid-19 infection on board. Then there was no reason for the captain to consider it differently, says the captain’s defender, Benedikte Jamth. The Norwegian doctor’s defender is also clear. – If it was meant that every cough should have been reported to the health authorities, then the ship should never have sailed. The doctors acted in line with the guidelines and routines that had been laid down, says Per Zimmer. Line Vold from FHI was summoned as a witness to shed light on the case. Photo: Even Bjøringsøy Johnsen / news Thought the information was correct Line Vold in FHI also testified. Her point of view is that the captain and the doctor knew or should have known that they had an infection on board. She believes Hurtigruten misinformed the authorities and withheld important information. Both the captain and the Norwegian doctor on the first voyage with MS “Roald Amundsen” believed that they had no sick people or people with symptoms of infection on board. At the same time, there were sick patients in isolation on both voyages, with fever, cough and other symptoms compatible with covid-19. – Our understanding of the situation was based on information from the ship. We assume that the information we had was correct. And that the obligation to notify was complied with, Line Vold said in his witness interview on Thursday. It turned out to be wrong. It is particularly the date 29 and 30 July that she explained about, one and two days before the cruise ship docked with infection on board in Tromsø. news has previously told that UNN took two minutes to notify about a possible outbreak, but no operators on the previous two days notified. The ship docked in Tromsø, and allowed all the passengers to go home without being tested. Photo: Terje Pedersen / NTB Would have intervened earlier Vold explained that she had received a promise from Hurtigruten that they would send out SMS to all passengers that they had to test themselves. – Hurtigruten called and said they were wondering if the person could really be infected there, because they didn’t see any infection, says Vold. FHI believed that there was a high probability that the infected person from Hadsel was infected with MS “Roald Amundsen”. – But based on the information from the ship, we had to assume that there were no sick people on board. And thus no breakouts. We considered that it could be an asymptomatic fellow passenger, perhaps, who had infected this person. She was asked if she would make a different assessment if she received information from the Norwegian doctor about patients in isolation with respiratory problems, fever and cough. – It will be hypothetical, but yes, it would have been handled differently. Then FHI, even though we are not obliged to notify, would contact the municipality’s chief inspector because we know it will be a big workload for the municipality, said Line Vold. Will not comment on individual circumstances The extensive outbreak of infection on board the MS “Roald Amundsen” became known far beyond Norway’s borders. The outbreak affected 69 municipalities and caused the government to tighten the rules for the entire cruise industry. Later it became known that 71 people from 7 different counties were infected. news has been in contact with the Ministry of Trade and Fisheries to see if they have a comment on Eilif Dahl’s plan. They haven’t replied. Hurtigruten, by communications manager Rune Thomas Ege, has told news that they believe it is not correct to comment on individual matters that come to light in the court case. – The police carried out a very thorough and comprehensive investigation over a period of almost two years, to which we actively contributed. The police’s investigation concluded that there is no basis for criticizing the company beyond what was the basis for the submission we received last winter. – We have been clear that we as a company made several mistakes. We have taken responsibility for that, and we have accepted the submission we were made, writes Ege in an e-mail.
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– I would never be allowed to sail – news Troms and Finnmark
