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Carnival Australia was proved to have been negligent and engaged in misleading representations over the COVID outbreak onboard Ruby Princess in March 2020, according to the Federal Court.
Of the 2600 passengers onboard the cruise from Sydney, more than 660 tested positive to the virus and 28 COVID positive people died.
The ship left Sydney on 8 March, 2020, just three days before COVID was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organisation, for a trip around New Zealand and returned on 19 March. The itinerary was originally 13 nights, but the cruise line cut this short after COVID case were reported on board.
A class action case by Shine Lawyers alleged that the outbreak of COVID on the ship resulted from a failure by the cruise line to take appropriate measures to ensure that passengers were safe and protected from contracting the virus on the ship. Shine argues that this failure constitutes breaches of the cruise owner and operator’s duty of care to its passengers, and of the consumer guarantees and other provisions of Australian Consumer Law.
The ruling was given by Justice Angus Stewart, who argued that Carnival was negligent in certain respects to precautions for passengers and was misleading in the cruise line’s pre-holiday communications with passengers that suggested it was ‘reasonably safe’ to take the cruise.
“To the respondents’ knowledge, to proceed with the cruise carried a significant risk of a coronavirus outbreak with possible disastrous consequences, yet they proceeded regardless,” Stewart said.
A Carnival spokesperson said that the cruise line has seen the judgment and is considering it in detail.
“The pandemic was a difficult time in Australia’s history, and we understand how heartbreaking it was for those affected,” the spokesperson said.
Susan Karpik, the lead plaintiff on the case, caught a mild case of COVID, but her husband Henry became quite ill and had to spend two months in hospital.
Karpik sought $360,000 in damages for personal injury, distress and disappointment, according to the ABC.
The judge awarded no damages, finding her case to be below the claimable threshold, as he was not satisfied that she had suffered from long COVID.
She was given $4400 plus interest for out of pocket medical expenses.
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