ABC 730 coronavirus stories – International versions

CoronaCruisesFromHell

 

TRANSCRIPT

PAUL FARRELL, REPORTER:  The Ruby Princess has shadowed the coast of Sydney ever since its controversial return to port more than a week ago.

 

 

(On phone) Hi June, how are you feeling?

 

 

JUNE HARDIMON:  I still feel stressed.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  June Hardimon and her husband, Ray were among the thousands of passengers who came ashore that day.

 

 

JUNE HARDIMON:  It was an engagement present from my grandson and his fiance.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  After she returned home, June began feeling unwell.

 

 

JUNE HARDIMON:  I felt nauseous a few times on and off and I had a few temperatures.

 

 

I am an asthmatic and I have a lung problem. She said, you're at high risk. So that's what we did and then the next day I got the results to say I was positive.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  The news came as a shock to 74-year-old June and husband Ray, who is caring for her.

 

 

JUNE HARDIMON:  With this virus, it's something that cannot be played around with and me being at high risk, of course, it has caused a lot of stress in my body.

 

 

BRONWYN MEREDITH, DAUGHTER:  I'm very worried about my parents. I haven't been able to see them after they came back from this cruise and all I want to do is hug mum and dad.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  In an email exchange with Princess Cruises the day before the ship docked, their daughter was told:

 

 

"We have a ship full of healthy guests and healthy crew. There are no coronavirus cases on board.”

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  7.30 asked the ship's owners, Carnival Australia, when the health situation changed.

 

 

The company didn't respond.

 

 

BRONWYN MEREDITH:  I was told that there was no-one on that cruise ship with COVID-19 or ill passengers.

 

 

They were herded off the Ruby Princess like cattle. Passports were not checked, ID cards not checked.

 

 

JUNE HARDIMON:  I found it was very frightening, because I thought one lady on the ship had died and that upset me and I felt well, I don't want to be the next one.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  The 2,700 people on board have now spread far and wide. Returning to homes in Wollongong, Port Augusta, Darwin, Melbourne, Moreton Bay and even abroad to the United States.

 

 

PROFESSOR RAINA MACINTYRE, UNIVERSITY OF NSW:  Closed environments where people mix together intensely, such as cruise ships, prisons, aged care facilities, are all at high risk for outbreaks and when those outbreaks happen, they tend to be more severe than outbreaks in other settings.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  Passengers from three other cruise ships also disembarked in Sydney in the last two weeks.

 

 

Karina Rogers and her daughter were on the Voyager of the Seas which arrived in Sydney on March 18.

 

 

KARINA ROGERS:  It started out really good. Everyone was happy, everyone was drinking. There was music. We had a great time.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  During the cruise, they met Garry Kirstenfeldt and his wife, Jenny.

 

 

KARINA ROGERS:  Five o'clock every day, we sit at the same table and they were just another couple with their daughter.

 

 

Garry was funny, he was, always had something to say, always smiling. Really just very, he had a lot of personality.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  Last week they turned on the news and were shocked to discover that Garry had died in hospital, days after testing positive for coronavirus.

 

 

KARINA ROGERS:  It didn't really hit home until yesterday, last night, when we heard about Garry, because there's a death on the ship now, like, that's how quick this has spread.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  Karina now has coronavirus, too.

 

 

KARINA ROGERS:  But it was a big shock because I thought, what am I going to tell people?

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:   While the Voyager was still at sea, it was rerouted to the port of Eden on the southern coast of New South Wales - a community heavily affected by the summer bushfire disaster.

 

 

DR JACLYN BROWN, MERIMBULA GP:  We have one district hospital, which has a handful of anaesthetists, a handful of ventilators and it's not equipped to deal with a mass outbreak.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  Merimbula GP, Jaclyn Brown campaigned with 40 other local medical practitioners to oppose the cruise ship's arrival.

 

 

They succeeded and the ship was diverted to Sydney.

 

 

JACLYN BROWN:  I think we had a near miss situation that we were able to foresee that this posed a risk to our community.

 

 

 

I still feel sick to my stomach that we transferred the problem to Sydney.

 

 

RAINA MACINTYRE:  Anywhere where those passengers went, there is a risk of outbreaks taking off.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  New South Wales Health did not respond to 7.30's questions about the decision to reroute the ship.

 

 

A spokesman for the Department of Premier and Cabinet says that the Police Commissioner is now managing cruise ship passengers.

 

 

MICK FULLER, NSW POLICE COMMISSIONER:  I can say the Federal Government has either late last night or really early this morning issued notices to any cruise ships in Australian waters to return to your port of commencement.

 

 

PAUL FARRELL:  Bronwyn Meredith is doing everything she can to support her parents from afar.

 

 

BRONWYN MEREDITH:  I hope mum makes a recovery. I don't want to lose my mother. I don't want to lose my father either.

 

 

This is breaking my heart every day and I have to be strong for them.

 

LUCY CARTER, REPORTER: Classical pianist Ambre Hammond never thought performing on a cruise ship could see her locked up in a Sydney hotel room for two weeks.

 

AMBRE HAMMOND: What essentially was meant to be a ten-day working holiday, I guess you'd call it, turned into a nightmare that just doesn't seem to have any finish line.

 

LUCY CARTER: After arriving from Hawaii on Thursday, Ambre and other passengers from the Norwegian Jewel were brought to the Swissotel in Sydney. The ship has had no confirmed cases of coronavirus.

 

AMBRE HAMMOND: So this is day two of quarantine and it's getting pretty harrowing actually, hearing the sounds of some of the people in the rooms next door, yelling and begging to be let out of the room because they're desperate for fresh air.

 

WOMAN (Yelling): Please, we've been stranded in here. You have no idea. You can't keep people locked up in their rooms and give them nothing. Sunshine, air. Exercise. Can't even get fresh air.

 

LUCY CARTER: Ambre says she's doing okay in hotel quarantine, but is deeply concerned for elderly people in nearby rooms.

 

AMBRE HAMMOND: There's a number of old, older people on their own and they're really suffering.

 

I can hear people down the hallway crying and there's a woman who's hysterical and pleading to be let out and she's having panic attacks, her husband is distraught.

 

There is people who need blood pressure medication, cholesterol tablets, insulin and they're calling me, and they're asking for help and um ... what to do?

 

LUCY CARTER: New South Wales police told 7.30 all those in quarantine have access to medical care, and all dietary needs are being met.

 

AMBRE HAMMOND'S DAUGHTER: After she left to perform on the cruise...

 

LUCY CARTER: Ambre's other concern is being separated from her 17-year-old daughter.

 

AMBRE HAMMOND: And I just can't believe that it's considered okay to keep a mother away from her child like this.

 

SCOTT MORRISON, PRIME MINISTER: States and territories will be quarantining all arrivals through our airports in hotels and other accommodation facilities for the two weeks of their mandatory self-isolation.

 

ASSOC. PROF. ADAM KAMRADT-SCOTT, UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY: This is not an ideal situation for anyone to confront and it was certainly not the Government's preference to have to go down this road.

 

LUCY CARTER: Adam Kamradt-Scott worked with the Rudd government in 2008 when it revised and tested Australia's pandemic preparedness plan.

 

ADAM KAMRADT-SCOTT: The reason why it's been necessary though is because we've heard of too many people that have not been doing the right thing and they've continued to move about the community, potentially spreading the virus even as they go and what we're trying desperately to avoid is widespread community transmission of this virus.

 

DR JENNY CAWSON: We're a bit worried about using the air conditioner.

 

LUCY CARTER: Dr Jenny Cawson and her husband, Dr Robert Rattray are concerned they could end up actually catching the coronavirus while under quarantine.

 

JENNY CAWSON: If we were at home, in Melbourne, in our own home, we'd be far less risk of getting the virus than we are in a hotel with food that's prepared by other people, and lots of people walking around in the lobby and we're transferred from place to place.

 

LUCY CARTER: They were among a group of doctors who arrived in Sydney on Friday evening after a month-long medical conference on board a cruise ship in Antarctic waters.

 

She and her partner are now at the Intercontinental Hotel in Sydney.

 

JENNY CAWSON: When we reached the hotel, the police were with us and they took all the details of the people who were staying in the hotel, their personal details and their flight numbers.

 

The police assured us that we would be able to fly the following day.

 

LUCY CARTER: Jenny Cawson says her group arrived in Sydney 24 hours before the forcible hotel quarantine period was due to begin and were given permission to leave.

 

JENNY CAWSON: They understood that they were free to leave and they were keen to get home as soon as possible.

 

They were all intending to go into isolation at home for two weeks, as we were.

 

LUCY CARTER: They and other passengers have since been accused of ignoring quarantine orders and attempting to abscond from health officials.

 

In a statement the New South Wales Police Commissioner said the doctors were: "... another example of members of the community who have not listened to the advice of the government."

 

Jenny and her husband deny they ignored official advice and say they were preparing to go into quarantine at home.

 

JENNY CAWSON: I think it has to be done. I understand that. We just seem to have been caught somehow in some sort of time warp in a period in which we should have been able to go free, but we were held by the government in hotels for a reason we don't really understand.

 

ADAM KAMRADT-SCOTT: The measures were announced rather, and implemented, rather quickly.

 

So there's a lot of discussions that have to be held before you end up getting a hotel to agree to this type of situation. That's probably why we've seen a few glitches.

 

ALAN GILES: This is our gilded prison, pretty much standard upmarket hotel room. Huge bed, some pretty nice city views outside the window.

 

LUCY CARTER: Not everyone is upset with the hotel quarantine arrangements. Many are just frustrated and bored.

 

ALAN GILES: 7:20 in the evening and we've just had our first dinner delivered to our room - a green chicken curry.

 

I'm happy with the decision that the Prime Minister made to get us here and I think I understand why he's done that.

 

I reckon we could probably last fairly well for four or five or six days. After that, we might be scratching our heads and wondering what the hell we're doing here.