Royal Caribbean's "Explorer Of the Seas" Returns Two Days Early After Nearly 700 People Got Sick
COOPER: Welcome back. Well, it's certainly was not the vacation they were hoping for. The Royal Caribbean cruise ship "Explorer of the Seas" returned two days early and will be explored by the CDC. Nearly 700 people on board got sick with symptoms consistent with the norovirus. It basically means they were a lot of vomiting and diarrhea happening on the cruise. The ship returned to Bayonne, New Jersey just today. Senior medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, is there. She joins me now live. So it sounds like a nightmare people getting sick all over the place. I know you are getting new details. How bad was it?</s>ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, from what the passengers have told us it was quite bad. I hope you don't mind I'm going to get a little graphic on you, Anderson. They describe walking around and seeing people sort of hunched in a corner vomiting into bags. One woman said she was in the dining hall and another woman was throwing up into a napkin. Another passenger said she saw someone in his pajamas just soiled from diarrhea and vomiting. It really sounded unpleasant. Let's hear directly from one passenger about her experience.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When I was in my room I didn't know about the other people until my husband went out and told the crew attendant. They come up, they got me a wheelchair. They put me in a wheelchair as they pushed me through the fifth floor, which was where the shops are through everyone. And we went down. When we went downstairs on the lift they opened the doors, you could see absolutely everyone sitting there being sick in buckets, in bags. It was awful. They just gave as us number to wait. I had to wait three hours to be seen.</s>COHEN: Now while some passengers were critical of Royal Caribbean and how they handled it. Others were quite complimentary and said they did a great job.</s>COOPER: So what's next for the cruise line? What happens now?</s>COHEN: Now Royal Caribbean says they're doing a thorough sanitation of the vessel. We asked the Centres for Disease Control what are they required to do after an outbreak like this. It turns out there aren't specific things that they have to do, cleaning up wise or hygiene- wise. There aren't specific things they need to do. They need to have a plan, but it's not clear how this cleaning will be more super duper than any other cleaning they do between cruises.</s>COOPER: Do passengers get compensated since the whole thing was cut short?</s>COHEN: You know, we've been told that they will get 50 percent of their money back, and then 50 percent off a future cruise. And then they got perks like free Wi-Fi because of this and $400 of cash to spend on board, and they got free wine and rum, according to the passengers. I'm not sure that's really what I would want to be drinking if I were in this condition. But you know, there it is.</s>COOPER: Free wine and rum and Wi-Fi, wow.</s>COHEN: There you go.</s>COOPER: All right, Elizabeth Cohen, appreciate it.</s>COHEN: While you're sick, you know, comfort.</s>COOPER: Thanks very much. If you've never been to Norway, the question is if you've never been to country like Norway are you actually qualified to be ambassador to a country like Norway? You might be surprised. "The Ridiculist" is next.