on a wet night in Yokohama Japan the
buses some Americans have been waiting
for finally arrived all right this is it
I'm about to step into the big wide
world so I have to put my mask on and
get going Sheryl and Paul molesky bid
farewell others are left to stay 300
Americans set off from the Diamond
Princess cruise liner late at night to
fly back to the u.s. we're exhausted a
flight like no other
complete with hazmat suits and masks
enroute to Texas for another 14 days of
quarantine on top of the fortnight
they've already had they leave as the
biggest spike in cases on board has been
confirmed 99 people have tested positive
bringing the total to 454 but for
British passengers still on board the
question is when can they get off the
son of a couple on the ship wants to
know this is my plea this is my plea and
is asking the government to help I want
my mum and dad to wake up in the morning
and actually have some information sent
to them I want them to be they need to
be communicated with no one's actually
speaking to them which is driving them
crazy as if it's like they must be going
crazy as it is just being things I like
having the Foreign Office say British
citizens could be flown home and they're
looking into a repatriation flight the
diamond princess now has the highest
number of people with Cova 19 outside of
Wuhan how did this all begin on the 1st
of February a cruise passenger from Hong
Kong tests positive for the kovat 19:00
virus when he gets off on the 3rd of
February the diamond princess is placed
on quarantine and screening onboard
starts on the 15th Americans are told
about evacuation plans to get them off
the ship
on the 16th are the countries including
Canada Israel and Australia announced
they're following suit and on the 19th
of Ferb it's expected this is when the
end of quarantine will happen
not all on board wants to come off
we spoke to American Matthew Smith who
decided to stay we have never gone
outside our cabin no one has ever come
in the I don't believe that the food
service or service from the crew is is
likely to have communicated the virus to
us and we do not have contact with
anyone out on the balconies so we
believe you know anything can happen but
we believe we're sufficiently protected
that there's no reason to be afraid of
having cotton if I caught the virus and
even if it somehow happened you know
we'll just deal with it being afraid of
it is not going to change here in the UK
the government of ramping up their
response for passengers arriving from
parts of China and Asia the Holiday Inn
near Heathrow is blocked booked as part
of measures to control the spread of the
virus but tonight the focus is on the
diamond Princess cruise liner with two
days of quarantine left questions are
being asked whether passengers should
have been taken off sooner as different
countries grapple with the best way to
deal with kovat 19 Ice Hotel reporting
well joining us now is dr. Natalie
McDermott a specialist in outbreak
Disease Control at King's College London
let's just stay with the ship for a
moment I mean why do you think it's been
such a disaster I mean everybody thought
oh what a clever idea but in fact it's
been a method of giving more people the
disease yeah I think is a bit of a
conundrum really because it should have
worked
so I think there probably needs to be an
investigation once everyone's off the
ship to identify what happened deed
quarantine measures fail so work was it
not being implemented properly was there
some kind of environmental source on the
ship that we need to know about that
helped in the transmission or is this
really just that actually a lot of
people were exposed a lot earlier than
we thought before quarantine started and
they're just showing symptoms over a
gradual period of time but I mean the
cruise ship is being isolated obviously
but at the same time we get this
information from here in Britain
that schools should sort of carry on if
a suspect suddenly comes to school and
they're worried about the worst well how
does that work yes the schools are being
advised if there's a suspect case so
that's someone who hasn't necessarily
tested positive for the virus yet they
just have symptoms that could meet with
the virus but we know that the symptoms
of this virus in the early stages are
very similar to any other coughing cold
or flu virus so it's very likely that
the child probably isn't infected and I
think at the moment they're trying to
encourage children to go to school
because we don't have any
person-to-person transmission of the
corona virus here in the UK at the
moment that's very interesting because
these plans to provide hotel rooms for
example for travelers are showing
symptoms at Heathrow how does that work
I mean if you're showing symptoms at
school but you haven't got it what's the
difference my understanding of the hotel
rooms is essentially contingency
planning so if there were a lot of
people coming off a flight or several
flights in one day who were thought to
be unwell in some way that were
identified this is somewhere that they
can be placed whilst they're awaiting
test results now in the unit's ounds a
little bit like the cruise liner i mean
well yes but but they're coming from
places that aren't known to be affected
and the cruise liner is known at the
moment to have had confirmed cases on
board in the UK at the moment we only
have one current confirmed case who is
isolated in a hospital so what public
health England are advising is children
can still go to school we shouldn't be
holding them back because of concerns
but if there is a confirmed case in a
school then they will take action and
discuss with the head teacher of the
school what measures need to be in place
and briefly teachers are fine providing
its only suspects and not confirmed and
workers at he's rarer okay providing the
same yes so essentially the the strategy
is always to do a risk assessment and
the risk assessment for someone in the
UK who hasn't travelled at the moment
would be very low that their symptoms
are of coronavirus especially if there's
no no
contact Heathrow the workers are safe
but obviously they will be contacted by
public health England if they're known
to have contact with someone who test
positive dr. Nathalie McDermott thank
you very much indeed for joining us