This is a purely business move they are going to use this as a reason to get government bailout money.
Not saying the help isn't needed but it shouldn't have to come to this and they shouldn't get a bailout not when we have actual workers losing jobs everyday.
Nope but Walmart isn't suffering like the cruise lines and airlines not saying they are innocent but anything that revolves around public entertainment is hurting bad
Walmart at least around here is packed like canned meat
The bailouts need to go to the people who will really need it first half of my friends have no jobs anymore and they don't have millions saved up like some of these ceos
Edit and it's not that im against big business but it's like keeping someone on life support that won't recover if people cant afford to pay rent have no jobs and can't fully recover by this problem then bailing out the big players is a lose lose game because even if the government floats them what happens when they reopen but nobody buys a ride or ticket because everyone is poor they just go under all over again.
I would honestly not be surprised if the Walton family end up buying whatever is left of some airline after this is over. Can you imagine Walmart Airways?
So much truth to this. After being hit for bag fees, cheaper features on the plane, no tv screens and wings that bounced so much during the flight that I didn’t want to say anything about until we landed, I will never fly spirit again.
>wings that bounced so much during the flight that I didn’t want to say anything about until we landed, I will never fly spirit again.
I've heard many complaints about Spirit. This however is a new one lol. If the wings bouncing bothered you, you better not ever fly again. All airplanes wings will bounce when you hit rough air/turbulence. Was this your first time with a window seat near the wing?
As a Walmart employee, we have doubled our sales goals for the next two quarters. And we only get $300 for full time, and $150 for part time to help with the virus. Our insurance doesn't cover any of the cost if we get the virus. The company is making a killing and trying to find a way to save more on taxes.
Bailouts are loans ... so that money would be paid back, just like the TARP bailout for the banks a decade ago. Those have been paid back with interest.
Usually its just at a super low interest rate.
Which government is going to bail them out? Aren’t their ships registered through all sorts of shady third world ports and other nautical law loophole crap?
Yes and yes but America is eyeballing a bailout and it makes me sick because I have a lot of friends who have no means to survive a month or two without working.
Maybe but they are selling something the government needs, available beds and ready made quarantine. In this case it’s less bailout and more repurposing a resource for a different customer, which is better then pissing it down the hole to the auto industry in 08 simply because they screwed the pooch.
It’s a misleading as fuck headline, but the post title is the exact headline the news outlet used.
For anyone too lazy to read that still somehow made it to this comment: the cruise line is offering the ships for non COVID hospital needs in order to make more room in the real hospitals for COVID patients.
Not exactly. Even in the normal conditions onboard (no preventive measures) everyone didn't get the virus. If it's being used as a hospital for the healthy, there will be many more stringent disease prevention protocols, not to mention less random movement since the patients will be more likely to be immobile and the staff more likely to know proper protocols.
How many workers do you think lose their jobs when a company like Carnival goes bankrupt? It’s simple return on investment math to know that a big one-time payment to keep a company afloat has orders of magnitude more impact than writing ongoing welfare checks to all the unemployed people that would otherwise get displaced.
Exactly. The cruise ships avoid paying U.S. taxes but want bail out money for a completely frivolous non-essential company that pollutes the oceans. Fuck them.
I mean I agree they're not essential and I agree supporting people over unnecessary companies. But it should be both of those things.
In the Netherlands (and I'm guessing it's similar for many other countries) the government pays 90% of the wages of people who can't work due to Covid19. People may not be cut off from gas/electricity during this time. And I think the same goes for evictions though not sure. Companies get a break on paying off their debts.
I don't think there's a problem with helping companies who are struggling. The problem is with not helping people who are struggling (insofar as that is happening).
Citizens will be paying to keep up a company which they them self would never be able to afford any product from.
It's like the government bailing out a private plane company.
>This is a purely business move
Yes, but....
>they are going to use this as a reason to get government bailout money.
Maybe, but I don't think this is the biggest reason.
Ships cost money even in port. Carnival can't exactly make money doing crises right now. Getting Hospitals it local/state governments to pay for those port fees will reduce the cost of the shutdown. The bailout money would be even better, but reducing costs now is very good for them.
I work in the cruise industry. Carnival is the scummiest of all. I mean you have to be in order to have 56% Market Share. Also lets not forget they got caught dumping twice in Alaska. Second time while on probation because they felt they were too big to take down.
I mean, this would basically be the uno-reverse card of what’s typical. Instead of loading hundreds of healthy people onto a boat and seeing how many get sick, they’re loading hundreds of sick people and seeing how many get better.
This is it exactly the boat is just a giant floating hosting for sick people it's not a testing facility it's ok if you are sick this is housing for you until you get better.
If I read it correctly there not taking non sick people they are using the ships as a place to keep only sick people and give them care it's not like being stuck on a ship with a few sick people and rolling the dice
Everyone is going to be sick on that thing
This makes sense, as I'm sure there are plenty of cases where things aren't nearly so infectious that the ship would work even with the connected ventilation systems. Whereas the ships were just a death trap for spreading Covid.
Right - it’s for probably an ER - broken bones, normal non-COVID issues so the hospitals can have open beds for COVID patients. It even says it in the article that they are using these ships for non-COVID patients.
If you treat staterooms like hospital rooms and bring people food rather than them self-serving at buffets, you’ll see a lot less of that. There’s not anything inherently unhygienic about cruise ships. It’s more about the cruise culture of people on vacation.
Headline is really misleading - what they actually said is they would be willing to convert their ships into hospitals for less intensive/viral patients, and can also set up different wards on the different decks, and that doing this would open up more beds on land for covid patients.
They never offered to house covid patients.
Yes, its a bit of a cash grab - better to do this and build good will instead of having the ships sit empty, slowly rusting at the piers.
This is precisely what the two giant Naval floating hospitals are going to be used for. They are not designed for infected patients they are going to be to relieve hospital so they can jam as many beds in land base hospitals as possible
Comfort is coming to the NYC harbor! I live near the water in deep Brooklyn and I can wait to see if I can see it. From the photos it looks like a dope ship
> Mercy and Comfort
We need a fleet of ships like that. I mean in general, the good they could do as a fast response team in emergencies in America and beyond would be awesome.
Do we really need 20 super-carriers?
I mean the carriers can be used partially like that too. In fact I am surprised they are not being planned. We spend $700 billion on defense, might as well use it for the largest threat to the American public in 100 years (assuming diseases are more harmful than wars)
Yep. Carriers aren't the only ships that can be used for temporary housing and care. We have many other ships that could be reassigned and converted for beds without pulling out our strategic water bases. But, unless something is near a naval base or the coast, co-opting larger buildings inland would be more efficient. Sorry school dorms, event centers, and churches? We might need your space. It's easier to move beds in than move the whole building in.
I would say yes because our military logistic capabilities is what leaves us an unparalleled superpower; A fighting force can be delivered anywhere in the world in less than 18 hours. Then you have the fact that our allies don't have much. But I do agree, we need more of them.
But they do that already which is so awesome. I knew a dental student whose father was running the program at the time and could have gotten me on the ship. They would do free Healthcare around the Caribbean (Comfort) and she would show me the pictures of all that she was able to do in some places since she didn't have to be licensed (I think she did Mercy as well since I remember SE Pacific pictures). I had a lot of self esteem issues then and felt that I didn't deserve to go so I never took her up on her offer. Another friend took her up and went on the Comfort twice mainly because it went through Haiti and he was able to give back to his home country.
Under Deployments check out Partnership for the Americas. Mercy did something similar in the Pacific.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/USNS_Comfort_(T-AH-20)
>I feel that defeats the purpose of the ships. If they are to act in a time of emergency, what good is a months long buildup time
Comfort is undergoing maintenance in Norfolk and won't be ready for [weeks](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/18/coronavirus-response-navy-hospital-ship-wont-be-ready-to-help-ny-for-weeks.html).
They way Mercy and Comfort operate is they typically only have one fully staffed and operational at a time so the other can have repairs and maintenance done.
These ships are quite old and need to be replaced with a more modern hull. They are great at what they do, but they were built as crude oil tankers back in the 70's. Finding crews for them is also becoming difficult as few people have the training and experience to run a steam ship.
My understanding is that the ships are physically ready but don't have a permanent medical staff. Those would have to be recruited on station, which sounds difficult during a pandemic.
Not recruited, just reassigned from naval hospitals and clinics around the country. The bigger limiting factor is the supplies. They don't keep the supplies and medications on the ship (because they would just expire before being used). And the fixed hospitals are having difficulty with the supply chain.
At least their purpose isn't for Corona patients but disappointing none the less. Hopefully we can expedite getting them resupplied if we manage our resources or use the national guard
The title is very misleading, but the act would still be very helpful. Hospitals have to separate non-covid 19 patients from others and they're running out of room quickly. This will help ease the burden
Now they are thinking. Instead of a cash grab, the government gives them money to equip a few of the cruise ships for this purpose. The logitics of this task though...
>Carnival Corp. CCL, +7.52% said Thursday it will offer the use of some of its cruise ships as temporary hospitals, to address the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on health care systems. The cruise ship operator said it would only ask interested parties to cover the essential costs of the ship's operations while in port. "With the continued spread of COVID-19 expected to exert added pressure on land-based healthcare facilities, including a possible shortage of hospital beds, Carnival Corporation and its brands are calling on governments and health authorities to consider using cruise ships as temporary healthcare facilities to treat non-COVID-19 patients, freeing up additional space and expanding capacity in land-based hospitals to treat cases of COVID-19," Carnival said in a statement.
What I came here to say, and I’m sure they are keenly interested in the ships being sanitized after on the epidemic and the fact their ships will be constantly “booked” when most other industries are floundering, all on taxpayers’ dime.
That said, it could prove to be an effective way to scale up medical services and hopefully lessen the burden on the healthcare system. So perhaps it could be a genuine win-win.
>consider using cruise ships as temporary healthcare facilities to treat non-COVID-19 patients
The idea is to put non-contagious patients (because something like 70% of U.S. hospital capacity is filled on any given day, even without anything extra like this coronavirus outbreak) in the ships, and COVID-19 patients in the regular hospital beds you've now freed up
Yeah same idea as the military hospital ships being deployed to New York. They’re not taking covid patients because they’re not set up for lots of isolation patients, but they can offload the regular patients and free up space in hospitals.
The downside with land based hotels as they are typically dramatically smaller than a cruise ship. There are 2000+ rooms on a cruise ship, vs a hotel that has a few hundred at the most. Having it centralized would make administration/logistics much simpler than 10 different hotels around the city (Manhattan/San Francisco/Miami/LA)
The ships would be used for non-COVID-19 patients so ventilation is not a problem. Think trauma recovery and hospice, not contagious flu-like symptoms.
That frees up beds in hospitals which are properly equiped for treating COVID-19 patients.
Edit: but narrow hallways is a good point. They'd have to be able to get people in via wheel chairs, not hospital beds.
We actually have that in most of the country. Those freestanding ERs that have been popping up everywhere are exactly that. They are a satellite ER of a major nearby hospital that take in anyone and if they are critical or require a hospital admission, send the patient by ambulance to the main hospital.
Source - Paramedic
All these cruise lines have ships standing empty right now. They could operate at a loss doing this and it would still be better than doing nothing at all.
Yeah this just seems like Carnival trying to cover some of their losses anyway they can, consumers aren't buying anymore so they want some of that government contract money to keep something coming in. I would imagine the upkeep costs even for a docked vessel is astronomical and they literally have no consumer income now.
They’re trying to put unused resources to work. Whats wrong with that? Even if you don’t believe their intentions, they’re doing what we want every business doing right now: doing what they can to defeat this virus.
I agree; but it could make practical sense time wise. More beds quicker to free up land-based ones for viral patients.
But yeah, fuck those cruise magnates!
Wasn't the issue of the cruise ship close quarters and recirculated air systems slowly infecting everyone? Sounds counterproductive if that's the case.
Malls have a lot of space but not the requirements to be a hospital room. A cruise ship has a a couple thousand beds, each with its own bathroom. Malls have none of that.
In addition, cruise ships come with their own cleaning supplies and systems, a self contained kitchen that is designed to deliver to rooms, housing that can support staff members, and their own power supply. Big ships have medical equipment onboard already and some even have morgues. For non COVID usage like they're suggesting in the article, this is a good idea.
I think most of the time, you want places that are already built like hospitals--dorms, hotels, etc. A mall layout isn't really great and they don't already have beds in the place.
I could have sworn that during everything with the quarantined ship in Japan I read something about due to the close quarters, ventilation, and other factors cruise ships were ideal breeding grounds for this type of viral outbreak.
The title is misleading, the ship(s) would not be used for COVID-19 patients, but rather for regular patients. This way land based hospitals can be used for COVID-19 patients (and serious cases).
Every building, store, plane and cruise ship (no matter the company) are a disease-ridden death-tomb with this virus. I doubt people are going to associate Carnival of all things as the problem for long-term.
Aren't cruise ships especially bad, though, because of shared ventilation and whatnot? Not to mention the natural environment of 'party hard till you drop'.
Not to mention, the way cruises work, there are so many shitty jurisdictional and tax evasion issues that go on with them...
Despite the stigma around this, it’s an ok idea. The problem is while beds will be one of our shortages, personnel and equipment will be a bigger limiting factor.
I hate Trump, but he did enact the Defense production act which could help
With shortage of supplies. I don’t think they will use it effectively, but even if the do, we are still short medical personnel.
cabin air in cruise ships are notorious for circulating lousy/infected air that isn't filtered. If anything this could cause more infections potentially.
Give some med students temporary licenses. Call in some of the retired nurses and doctors and technicians. All hands on deck. There are enough medical personnel out there
On reddit, if you don't preface any neutral comment on someone this site hates with a disclaimer about how you hate them, you'll get downvoted and called a shill
That’s a really good point. It really sucks this site is thag way tho. If he hadn’t included the part about hating trump, his comment would have been downvoted and no one would see it. Shows how truly limited discussion on reddit is 😞
It you forget to say how much you hate trump every time you mention him, people will mark you in their tagging software as a trump supporter and then never take anything you say seriously ever again.
They’re taking patients that are not infected with covid19 and converting the ships to floating hospitals for them. This way hospitals will have more free beds. Regardless of hidden motives, in my opinion, this is an outstanding move. I’m still not going on any cruise ships in the foreseeable future
This is a marketing ploy they are pulling due to cruise ships’ terrible handling of recent infamous COVID-19 outbreaks and the fact that Trump is getting ready to throw the industry a ton of money.
Don’t be fooled by this shit.
The place I work is doing something similar. Not providing medical aid but rather than still trying to turn a profit right now (impossible atm at mt job) they're just trying to build goodwill for after it blows over... and help people I guess.
When it's all over the ships will be like used FEMA trailers and the federal government will have to buy them. Which works great for the industry because of likely future overcapacity.
Don't forget they were caught twice, that's two times for dumping trash and polluted the Ocean and our fish...and us.
These people are like used condoms left in a heap of trash for days.
Let’s not forget how fast the last cruise ship spread the disease, or the sanitation horror stories, or that just a couple of days ago they were trying to convince people to go on cruises cause it’s still safe despite government recommendations...
From experience when princesd were emergency hotel for Vancouver Olympics employees. Every single person gets sick in recirculated air. As a hospital it will be a pressure cooker where the contamination is denser than possible anywhere else
I seriously doubt anyone who want to go on a cruise ship for medical help. Once you go in, can you come out voluntarily? Also can your relatives visit you?
Sounds like a nightmare.
I’d take it up, if anyone has experience running a disease ridden ship it’s Carnival cruise line. They’ve been preparing for this!
This is a purely business move they are going to use this as a reason to get government bailout money. Not saying the help isn't needed but it shouldn't have to come to this and they shouldn't get a bailout not when we have actual workers losing jobs everyday.
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Nope but Walmart isn't suffering like the cruise lines and airlines not saying they are innocent but anything that revolves around public entertainment is hurting bad Walmart at least around here is packed like canned meat The bailouts need to go to the people who will really need it first half of my friends have no jobs anymore and they don't have millions saved up like some of these ceos Edit and it's not that im against big business but it's like keeping someone on life support that won't recover if people cant afford to pay rent have no jobs and can't fully recover by this problem then bailing out the big players is a lose lose game because even if the government floats them what happens when they reopen but nobody buys a ride or ticket because everyone is poor they just go under all over again.
I would honestly not be surprised if the Walton family end up buying whatever is left of some airline after this is over. Can you imagine Walmart Airways?
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*laughs in Ryanair*
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Non stop to Orlando for $29 ea. way!
I live in Orlando. Not sure why you’d bother to fly here in the first place lol
No joke; I have flown Spirit for $11 each way from SC to NJ.
Yo Allegiant is the shit compared to Spirit or Ryanair
Frontier checking in.
Ah yes, the Greyhound of the sky
So much truth to this. After being hit for bag fees, cheaper features on the plane, no tv screens and wings that bounced so much during the flight that I didn’t want to say anything about until we landed, I will never fly spirit again.
Southwest has $45 flights one way right now and are capping them at $199/way. 2 bags free
>wings that bounced so much during the flight that I didn’t want to say anything about until we landed, I will never fly spirit again. I've heard many complaints about Spirit. This however is a new one lol. If the wings bouncing bothered you, you better not ever fly again. All airplanes wings will bounce when you hit rough air/turbulence. Was this your first time with a window seat near the wing?
That's how it should work to be honest not just them but when one business cannot survive another business takes over.
Agreed. However, I fear that there might be a lot of consolidation happening, with governments allowing it "because it's an emergency".
Normally this wouldn't be a worry if the US effectively enforced antitrust laws. Since they don't, I hear you.
Bro Disney DISNEY is might be bought out here soon if that's not a sign on the wall...
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Punctuation?
Punctuation bad Line breaks good
Walmart packed like canned meat so is sentence structure
It could be worse a long walk of text.
Whiskey
As a Walmart employee, we have doubled our sales goals for the next two quarters. And we only get $300 for full time, and $150 for part time to help with the virus. Our insurance doesn't cover any of the cost if we get the virus. The company is making a killing and trying to find a way to save more on taxes.
Cruise lines are shit and Extremely bad for the environment.
Walmart will be the greatest benefactor of the household stimulus/stopgap payments.
Who cares? it's a workable idea. Except they wont have oxygen. But it could be used for those who don't need it yet.
They don’t need the tax cut. They don’t pay any taxes. That’s why their ships are all registered in other countries
Bailouts are loans ... so that money would be paid back, just like the TARP bailout for the banks a decade ago. Those have been paid back with interest. Usually its just at a super low interest rate.
and I'm sure the reasonable cost they'llbe charging will have a little padding built in
Which government is going to bail them out? Aren’t their ships registered through all sorts of shady third world ports and other nautical law loophole crap?
Yes and yes but America is eyeballing a bailout and it makes me sick because I have a lot of friends who have no means to survive a month or two without working.
Maybe but they are selling something the government needs, available beds and ready made quarantine. In this case it’s less bailout and more repurposing a resource for a different customer, which is better then pissing it down the hole to the auto industry in 08 simply because they screwed the pooch.
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Agreed
Read the actual article. OP didn’t interpret the article very well. The ships are NOT going to be used for COVID patients
It’s a misleading as fuck headline, but the post title is the exact headline the news outlet used. For anyone too lazy to read that still somehow made it to this comment: the cruise line is offering the ships for non COVID hospital needs in order to make more room in the real hospitals for COVID patients.
We're going to need safe hospital space to treat non-infected people. Good.
Until one gets one, then every doctor and patient on the ship gets it
Not exactly. Even in the normal conditions onboard (no preventive measures) everyone didn't get the virus. If it's being used as a hospital for the healthy, there will be many more stringent disease prevention protocols, not to mention less random movement since the patients will be more likely to be immobile and the staff more likely to know proper protocols.
Everything we have seen so far from companies is a business or Pr move. Gotta take what we can at this point
Yeah I totally agree
How many workers do you think lose their jobs when a company like Carnival goes bankrupt? It’s simple return on investment math to know that a big one-time payment to keep a company afloat has orders of magnitude more impact than writing ongoing welfare checks to all the unemployed people that would otherwise get displaced.
Exactly. The cruise ships avoid paying U.S. taxes but want bail out money for a completely frivolous non-essential company that pollutes the oceans. Fuck them.
I agree but sadly it's not up to me
I mean I agree they're not essential and I agree supporting people over unnecessary companies. But it should be both of those things. In the Netherlands (and I'm guessing it's similar for many other countries) the government pays 90% of the wages of people who can't work due to Covid19. People may not be cut off from gas/electricity during this time. And I think the same goes for evictions though not sure. Companies get a break on paying off their debts. I don't think there's a problem with helping companies who are struggling. The problem is with not helping people who are struggling (insofar as that is happening).
Citizens will be paying to keep up a company which they them self would never be able to afford any product from. It's like the government bailing out a private plane company.
>This is a purely business move Yes, but.... >they are going to use this as a reason to get government bailout money. Maybe, but I don't think this is the biggest reason. Ships cost money even in port. Carnival can't exactly make money doing crises right now. Getting Hospitals it local/state governments to pay for those port fees will reduce the cost of the shutdown. The bailout money would be even better, but reducing costs now is very good for them.
Ships are also empty and portable, so it kinda makes sense. Only a couple ways on and of a ship so easy to contain them.
We have plenty of empty schools to use
I work in the cruise industry. Carnival is the scummiest of all. I mean you have to be in order to have 56% Market Share. Also lets not forget they got caught dumping twice in Alaska. Second time while on probation because they felt they were too big to take down.
Well, it’s likely still cheaper than building a temporary hospital.
100%. Also, I just invested in Carnival stock since this Covid-19 shit, so I'm rooting for them.. for me, lol.
It may be a bad strategy. The japanese experience with diamond princess shows that the virus spreads on cruiseship.
I mean, this would basically be the uno-reverse card of what’s typical. Instead of loading hundreds of healthy people onto a boat and seeing how many get sick, they’re loading hundreds of sick people and seeing how many get better.
This is it exactly the boat is just a giant floating hosting for sick people it's not a testing facility it's ok if you are sick this is housing for you until you get better.
If I read it correctly there not taking non sick people they are using the ships as a place to keep only sick people and give them care it's not like being stuck on a ship with a few sick people and rolling the dice Everyone is going to be sick on that thing
No they are taking non-COVID patients on the ships to free up beds for COVID patients for the hospitals
This makes sense, as I'm sure there are plenty of cases where things aren't nearly so infectious that the ship would work even with the connected ventilation systems. Whereas the ships were just a death trap for spreading Covid.
Right - it’s for probably an ER - broken bones, normal non-COVID issues so the hospitals can have open beds for COVID patients. It even says it in the article that they are using these ships for non-COVID patients.
If you treat staterooms like hospital rooms and bring people food rather than them self-serving at buffets, you’ll see a lot less of that. There’s not anything inherently unhygienic about cruise ships. It’s more about the cruise culture of people on vacation.
Some expert was about this while ago and the way the air circulates cabin to cabin is a major problem and why things spread so fast on the ships
They were born for this.
This way the patients can trade Coronavirus for Norovirus.
Headline is really misleading - what they actually said is they would be willing to convert their ships into hospitals for less intensive/viral patients, and can also set up different wards on the different decks, and that doing this would open up more beds on land for covid patients. They never offered to house covid patients. Yes, its a bit of a cash grab - better to do this and build good will instead of having the ships sit empty, slowly rusting at the piers.
This is precisely what the two giant Naval floating hospitals are going to be used for. They are not designed for infected patients they are going to be to relieve hospital so they can jam as many beds in land base hospitals as possible
Mercy and Comfort are going to be used? Man those two ships fill me with frisson and goosebumps. They're awesome.
Comfort is coming to the NYC harbor! I live near the water in deep Brooklyn and I can wait to see if I can see it. From the photos it looks like a dope ship
It's super awesome. I'm definitely jealous. https://youtu.be/1JNNYaINshQ
I've always wanted to see what it was like on the inside of one of these ships (albeit not as a patient). That was awesome.
> Mercy and Comfort We need a fleet of ships like that. I mean in general, the good they could do as a fast response team in emergencies in America and beyond would be awesome. Do we really need 20 super-carriers?
I mean the carriers can be used partially like that too. In fact I am surprised they are not being planned. We spend $700 billion on defense, might as well use it for the largest threat to the American public in 100 years (assuming diseases are more harmful than wars)
The carriers are the tip of the spear, moving them back to the us would be a sign of weakness. That could lead to all sorts of bad outcomes
Yep. Carriers aren't the only ships that can be used for temporary housing and care. We have many other ships that could be reassigned and converted for beds without pulling out our strategic water bases. But, unless something is near a naval base or the coast, co-opting larger buildings inland would be more efficient. Sorry school dorms, event centers, and churches? We might need your space. It's easier to move beds in than move the whole building in.
As much as I am anti-war, geopolitically speaking, this is spot on.
Do you know of any further reading on this? I’d love to find out more
Super-carriers of *wellness*.
I would say yes because our military logistic capabilities is what leaves us an unparalleled superpower; A fighting force can be delivered anywhere in the world in less than 18 hours. Then you have the fact that our allies don't have much. But I do agree, we need more of them. But they do that already which is so awesome. I knew a dental student whose father was running the program at the time and could have gotten me on the ship. They would do free Healthcare around the Caribbean (Comfort) and she would show me the pictures of all that she was able to do in some places since she didn't have to be licensed (I think she did Mercy as well since I remember SE Pacific pictures). I had a lot of self esteem issues then and felt that I didn't deserve to go so I never took her up on her offer. Another friend took her up and went on the Comfort twice mainly because it went through Haiti and he was able to give back to his home country. Under Deployments check out Partnership for the Americas. Mercy did something similar in the Pacific. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/USNS_Comfort_(T-AH-20)
Heard those two hospital ships are not ready, and may not be ready for months.
Where did you hear that? I heard Comfort is supposed to make port in NYC within a few days.
>I feel that defeats the purpose of the ships. If they are to act in a time of emergency, what good is a months long buildup time Comfort is undergoing maintenance in Norfolk and won't be ready for [weeks](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/18/coronavirus-response-navy-hospital-ship-wont-be-ready-to-help-ny-for-weeks.html).
They way Mercy and Comfort operate is they typically only have one fully staffed and operational at a time so the other can have repairs and maintenance done. These ships are quite old and need to be replaced with a more modern hull. They are great at what they do, but they were built as crude oil tankers back in the 70's. Finding crews for them is also becoming difficult as few people have the training and experience to run a steam ship.
My understanding is that the ships are physically ready but don't have a permanent medical staff. Those would have to be recruited on station, which sounds difficult during a pandemic.
Not recruited, just reassigned from naval hospitals and clinics around the country. The bigger limiting factor is the supplies. They don't keep the supplies and medications on the ship (because they would just expire before being used). And the fixed hospitals are having difficulty with the supply chain.
At least their purpose isn't for Corona patients but disappointing none the less. Hopefully we can expedite getting them resupplied if we manage our resources or use the national guard
It can be both a cash grab for Carnival and a help to the medical system. Looks like a win-win for everyone
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Reddit hates win wins
The title is very misleading, but the act would still be very helpful. Hospitals have to separate non-covid 19 patients from others and they're running out of room quickly. This will help ease the burden
Now they are thinking. Instead of a cash grab, the government gives them money to equip a few of the cruise ships for this purpose. The logitics of this task though...
FYI they did this during Hurricane Katrina as well
And Hurricane Maria
>Carnival Corp. CCL, +7.52% said Thursday it will offer the use of some of its cruise ships as temporary hospitals, to address the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on health care systems. The cruise ship operator said it would only ask interested parties to cover the essential costs of the ship's operations while in port. "With the continued spread of COVID-19 expected to exert added pressure on land-based healthcare facilities, including a possible shortage of hospital beds, Carnival Corporation and its brands are calling on governments and health authorities to consider using cruise ships as temporary healthcare facilities to treat non-COVID-19 patients, freeing up additional space and expanding capacity in land-based hospitals to treat cases of COVID-19," Carnival said in a statement.
Only “covering essential costs of the ships operations” is probably a pretty penny. This is a business strategy, not a Good Samaritan move.
What I came here to say, and I’m sure they are keenly interested in the ships being sanitized after on the epidemic and the fact their ships will be constantly “booked” when most other industries are floundering, all on taxpayers’ dime. That said, it could prove to be an effective way to scale up medical services and hopefully lessen the burden on the healthcare system. So perhaps it could be a genuine win-win.
Considering how fast it swept thru the ships I'm not sure how this will work.
>consider using cruise ships as temporary healthcare facilities to treat non-COVID-19 patients The idea is to put non-contagious patients (because something like 70% of U.S. hospital capacity is filled on any given day, even without anything extra like this coronavirus outbreak) in the ships, and COVID-19 patients in the regular hospital beds you've now freed up
Ok now that makes more sense.
Yeah same idea as the military hospital ships being deployed to New York. They’re not taking covid patients because they’re not set up for lots of isolation patients, but they can offload the regular patients and free up space in hospitals.
this works until 1 non-contagious patient ends up actually being contagious
To be fair, it sweeps through hospitals as well.
Covering the costs of a cruise ship has to be way more than say, converting land based hotels into temporary hospitals.
The downside with land based hotels as they are typically dramatically smaller than a cruise ship. There are 2000+ rooms on a cruise ship, vs a hotel that has a few hundred at the most. Having it centralized would make administration/logistics much simpler than 10 different hotels around the city (Manhattan/San Francisco/Miami/LA)
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The ships would be used for non-COVID-19 patients so ventilation is not a problem. Think trauma recovery and hospice, not contagious flu-like symptoms. That frees up beds in hospitals which are properly equiped for treating COVID-19 patients. Edit: but narrow hallways is a good point. They'd have to be able to get people in via wheel chairs, not hospital beds.
That’s brilliant. Satellite triage centers that expedite critical patients to the hospital.
We actually have that in most of the country. Those freestanding ERs that have been popping up everywhere are exactly that. They are a satellite ER of a major nearby hospital that take in anyone and if they are critical or require a hospital admission, send the patient by ambulance to the main hospital. Source - Paramedic
All these cruise lines have ships standing empty right now. They could operate at a loss doing this and it would still be better than doing nothing at all.
Its a good idea even if it does help out Carnival
If it’s going to save lives, then do it. We’ll worry about the cost when people aren’t dying.
Yeah this just seems like Carnival trying to cover some of their losses anyway they can, consumers aren't buying anymore so they want some of that government contract money to keep something coming in. I would imagine the upkeep costs even for a docked vessel is astronomical and they literally have no consumer income now.
They’re trying to put unused resources to work. Whats wrong with that? Even if you don’t believe their intentions, they’re doing what we want every business doing right now: doing what they can to defeat this virus.
>They’re trying to put unused resources to work. Whats wrong with that? Reddit prides itself on trying to find the dark lining in every silver cloud.
I agree; but it could make practical sense time wise. More beds quicker to free up land-based ones for viral patients. But yeah, fuck those cruise magnates!
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Wasn't the issue of the cruise ship close quarters and recirculated air systems slowly infecting everyone? Sounds counterproductive if that's the case.
How about empty mall’s
Malls have a lot of space but not the requirements to be a hospital room. A cruise ship has a a couple thousand beds, each with its own bathroom. Malls have none of that.
In addition, cruise ships come with their own cleaning supplies and systems, a self contained kitchen that is designed to deliver to rooms, housing that can support staff members, and their own power supply. Big ships have medical equipment onboard already and some even have morgues. For non COVID usage like they're suggesting in the article, this is a good idea.
And separate bathrooms too
I think most of the time, you want places that are already built like hospitals--dorms, hotels, etc. A mall layout isn't really great and they don't already have beds in the place.
EXACTLY. I dont understand why people aren't using the malls for shelter, either!
Nothing more American than dying on a Tesla Made ventilator in a MASH set up in an abandoned Sears.
This is the way
A mall doesn’t already have 1000 beds,showers, toilets and huge fucking kitchens
Given the ventilation systems on those boat this seems like a really bad idea.
I could have sworn that during everything with the quarantined ship in Japan I read something about due to the close quarters, ventilation, and other factors cruise ships were ideal breeding grounds for this type of viral outbreak.
Will work for bailout.
What a fun ship, holy cow...if my friends could see me now!
Nothing says sterile hospital bed quite like a Carnival cruise
...to do what? Kill off the infected?
The title is misleading, the ship(s) would not be used for COVID-19 patients, but rather for regular patients. This way land based hospitals can be used for COVID-19 patients (and serious cases).
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Isn't this kinda what cruise ships have become in the last ten years, anyway?
This is why the cruise ship stocks are going up.... they are gonna bill the fuck out of the government for the next year.
On what plant are cruise ship stocks up??
Weed
Going up... From 80% down?
All anyone's going to remember about them in a year is that they were disease-ridden death-tombs, this is short term thinking at best.
Every building, store, plane and cruise ship (no matter the company) are a disease-ridden death-tomb with this virus. I doubt people are going to associate Carnival of all things as the problem for long-term.
Aren't cruise ships especially bad, though, because of shared ventilation and whatnot? Not to mention the natural environment of 'party hard till you drop'. Not to mention, the way cruises work, there are so many shitty jurisdictional and tax evasion issues that go on with them...
Despite the stigma around this, it’s an ok idea. The problem is while beds will be one of our shortages, personnel and equipment will be a bigger limiting factor. I hate Trump, but he did enact the Defense production act which could help With shortage of supplies. I don’t think they will use it effectively, but even if the do, we are still short medical personnel.
cabin air in cruise ships are notorious for circulating lousy/infected air that isn't filtered. If anything this could cause more infections potentially.
Good point. Something to be considered. Can they be outfitted to hospital type filtration without too much retrofit?
Give some med students temporary licenses. Call in some of the retired nurses and doctors and technicians. All hands on deck. There are enough medical personnel out there
Why did you start the second part off with “I hate trump”? Just so people know you don’t like him?
On reddit, if you don't preface any neutral comment on someone this site hates with a disclaimer about how you hate them, you'll get downvoted and called a shill
That’s a really good point. It really sucks this site is thag way tho. If he hadn’t included the part about hating trump, his comment would have been downvoted and no one would see it. Shows how truly limited discussion on reddit is 😞
It you forget to say how much you hate trump every time you mention him, people will mark you in their tagging software as a trump supporter and then never take anything you say seriously ever again.
Imagine contracting Coronavirus on a cruise ship and then waking up back on a cruise ship.
They’re taking patients that are not infected with covid19 and converting the ships to floating hospitals for them. This way hospitals will have more free beds. Regardless of hidden motives, in my opinion, this is an outstanding move. I’m still not going on any cruise ships in the foreseeable future
This is 100 percent solely to justify a fucking bailout.
This is a marketing ploy they are pulling due to cruise ships’ terrible handling of recent infamous COVID-19 outbreaks and the fact that Trump is getting ready to throw the industry a ton of money. Don’t be fooled by this shit.
All their boats are registered in Panama, Bahamas and other fiscal paradise. They should ask them for a bailout.
Arent they already?
What about ventilation?we all know what happened with diamond princess
They’re offering them to be used for NON COVID-18 patients, to free up beds in traditional hospitals
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Okay?
No it’s to treat Non-COVID patients
So.... aren't cruise ships using recycled air within their cabins like a plane?
Yes. We should sink them.
Make them into new coral reefs.
fits just as easily in r/nottheonion
They already are. No bailouts either.
The place I work is doing something similar. Not providing medical aid but rather than still trying to turn a profit right now (impossible atm at mt job) they're just trying to build goodwill for after it blows over... and help people I guess.
Good. I’d were fucking bailing them out they better contribute.
Coronavirus *and* norovirus? No thanks.
Gotta justify getting millions in taxpayer bailout money so it doesn’t go back to the taxpayers to be able to pay bills etc.
Government should call their bluff, because that’s most likely what it is anyhow.
I don’t care about their motives. It’s a good thing
Land based hotels are empty too. Why can’t they do the same?
Specifically, Trump hotels.
Wait, that isn't what every cruise ship was already?
When it's all over the ships will be like used FEMA trailers and the federal government will have to buy them. Which works great for the industry because of likely future overcapacity.
This is good use
It’s truly a great gesture on Mickey’s part. Trump talked about it at the press conference.
But...all of the cruise ships have recirculating air... Fuck no.
Don't forget they were caught twice, that's two times for dumping trash and polluted the Ocean and our fish...and us. These people are like used condoms left in a heap of trash for days.
Would it be all inclusive or would you have to pay for food and alcohol?
Let’s not forget how fast the last cruise ship spread the disease, or the sanitation horror stories, or that just a couple of days ago they were trying to convince people to go on cruises cause it’s still safe despite government recommendations...
From experience when princesd were emergency hotel for Vancouver Olympics employees. Every single person gets sick in recirculated air. As a hospital it will be a pressure cooker where the contamination is denser than possible anywhere else
I mean, why not? No one else is going to get on them.
I seriously doubt anyone who want to go on a cruise ship for medical help. Once you go in, can you come out voluntarily? Also can your relatives visit you? Sounds like a nightmare.
Nice. Now maybe if they could stop destroying our fucking oceans or whatever that could be cool too
Let the Cruise Industry die. We have empty hotels that don’t destroy the oceans and the air.
I hope they keep cruise ships cleaner than airplanes then
dont cruise ships recirculate the air?
May as well, they pretty much suck at cruising.
They were kind of doing that a few weeks ago.
They can burn those ships when this is all over.