‘Negative’ passengers on quarantined ferry being brought to land
Passengers who have tested negative for the new coronavirus on the Eleftherios Venizelos ferry quarantined off the port of Piraeus are being transferred to the mainland and put up in hotels in the Greek capital.
The 261 passengers will have to spend 14 days in quarantine in hotels working with Greece’s Civil Protection Secretariat before they can be given the all-clear and repatriated to their countries of residence.
They are among 380 people on the Eleftherios Venizelos, a Greek-owned, Turkish-chartered ferry that has been in quarantine off Piraeus Port since March 22 after two coronavirus infections onboard were confirmed. Since, a total of 119 passengers and crew have contracted Covid-19.
The passenger ferry had sailed from Piraeus on March 7 to pick up 350 shipyard workers from Turkey and take them to Spain for a project on a cruise liner. The ship was turned away from Spain due to the epidemic outbreak and returned to Turkey, where it was also turned away, according to the Athens-Macedonian News Agency. It eventually made its way to Piraeus on March 22 but was ordered to stay at anchor outside the port.
Most of the passengers are Turkish nationals, while the crew is Greek. There are also nationals from Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Philippines, Belarus, Bulgaria and the United States.
