Stranded at sea but retired nurse registers for frontline

Smiling for a photo in the Southern Patagonian Ice Fields, Evelyn Wojcik and husband Donald could never have imagined how quickly their dream cruise could turn into a nightmare.

The retired NHS Scotland workers remain stranded on board the Coral Princess where two passengers have died from Covid-19, and 10 further positive cases are confirmed.

After one month at sea, the stricken ship docked in Miami, Florida, yesterday when critically-ill passengers were to taken off first followed by healthy passengers.

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Speaking from her cabin on the Coral Princess, Evelyn, 58, said: “Yesterday, the captain told us that two passengers had sadly passed away the night before. It’s very sad and I feel for their families. As a nurse, I’m used to dealing with death but I can only imagine others on board will be scared. We are desperate to get home.”

Evelyn and Donald, from Edinburgh, are among nearly 400 British passengers trapped on board the Coral Princess since it last made land at The Falkland Islands on March 13.

The couple are eager to join in the NHS effort to treat Scots. But they say the Foreign Commonwealth Office (FCO) should have done more to rescue Brits on board before 12 positive Covid-19 cases were confirmed on April 2.

They say the majority of British passengers were stopped from disembarking at Buenos Aires on March 19, and again in Rio de Janeiro on March 26, despite some having flights already booked for the UK on those dates.

“I believe that if the Foreign Office had taken decisive action earlier then we could be home by now instead of sitting quarantined in our rooms and worrying that there’s Covid-19 on the ship,” said Evelyn.

On April 2, Princess Cruises confirmed that 12 people on board the Coral Princess had tested positive for Covid-19, including seven passengers and five crew members. The FCO consulate in Miami later confirmed that no British passengers had tested positive for the virus.

Having been turned away from a number of South American ports, the ship had been sailing to Fort Lauderdale with 1,020 guests and 878 crew on board. But with the situation critical, it is heading for Miami.

A spokesperson for Princess Cruises said: “In response to a reported small cluster of cases of respiratory illness, Coral Princess collected and sent 13 Covid-19 test samples to Barbados on March 31. We can confirm the results yielded 12 positive cases: seven guests and five crew.”

Evelyn is proud of the 20,000 former NHS workers who have returned to fight the virus. “We’re both happy to return to work if possible. I’m recently retired but re-registered as a nurse while on the ship,” she said. “It’s been brilliant to see such a response from retired NHS workers. It’s a selfless act.”

Evelyn and Donald began their cruise on March 5 in Santiago, Chile, as there had been no government warnings to Brits not to travel, and South America reportedly virus-free at the time.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab previously estimated that between 300,000 and one million British citizens were still abroad, although “hundreds of thousands” have returned in the past two weeks, according to the FCO.

A spokesperson for Princess Cruises said: “Disembarkation of guests is expected to take several days due to limited flight availability. Guests requiring shoreside medical care will be prioritised to disembark first.”