CRUISE LINERS TO START CRUISING VIA SA IN DECEMBER

After almost two years of not being able to do cruises, MSC has announced that it will be able to do cruises from and to South Africa again on 6 December.

In a statement, MSC Cruises said that it plans to implement stringent health and safety measures onboard the MSC Orchestra and all destinations that the ship will call at. These measures are based on an industry-leading protocol it introduced in August 2020 for the wellbeing of passengers, crew and the destinations served by its vessels.

IOL reports that all passengers, both vaccinated and unvaccinated, will be required to take a COVID-19 TR-PCR test within 72 hours of their cruise departure and provide proof of a negative result in order to board. Unvaccinated guests over the age of 18 years will additionally have to undergo an antigen lateral flow test at the embarkation port costing R300 per person.

Other countries have opened their ports for cruise liners over the last few months as vaccination rates have been increasing.

It’s not clear when other international cruise liners will also resume their South African cruises.

Image credit: MSC Cruises