Environmental Sampling for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 During a COVID-19 Outbreak on the Diamond Princess Cruise Ship
Takuya Yamagishi, Makoto Ohnishi, Nobuaki Matsunaga, Kensaku Kakimoto, Hajime Kamiya, Kiyoko Okamoto, Motoi Suzuki, Yoshiaki Gu, Mikiyo Sakaguchi, Taichi Tajima, Saho Takaya, Norio Ohmagari, Makoto Takeda, S Matsuyama, Kazuya Shirato, Naganori Nao, Hideki Hasegawa, Tsutomu Kageyama, Ikuyo Takayama, Shinji Saito, Koji Wada, Retsu Fujita, Hiroki Saito, Keiji Okinaka, Matthew Griffith, Amy Elizabeth Parry, Brenda Barnetson, James B. Leonard, Takaji Wakita
Abstract
During a COVID-19 outbreak on the Diamond Princess cruise ship we sampled environmental surfaces after passengers and crew vacated cabins. SARS-CoV-2 RNA was detected in 58 of 601 samples (10%) from case cabins 1-17 days after cabins were vacated but not from noncase cabins. There was no difference in detection proportion between cabins of symptomatic (15%, 28/189; cycle quantification [Cq], 29.79-38.86) and asymptomatic cases (21%, 28/131; Cq, 26.21-38.99). No SARS-CoV-2 virus was isolated from any of the samples. Transmission risk of SARS-CoV-2 from symptomatic and asymptomatic patients may be similar and surfaces could be involved in transmission.