Florida mayor: 1 more death tied to virus-stricken cruise

MIAMI (AP) — Fourteen people from a cruise ship that docked in Florida over the weekend with coronavirus victims aboard were hospitalized and one of them later died, authorities said Sunday. Two fatalities had been reported previously aboard the Coral Princess.

The Princess Cruises ship, which docked Saturday in Miami, also began disembarking on Sunday fit passengers who were cleared for charter flights out. Passengers with symptoms of COVID-19 or recovering from it were being kept on the ship until medically cleared.

In a statement Sunday night, the Miami-Dade County mayor's office said one of the six people removed Saturday from the ship had died after being taken by private ambulance to a Hialeah hospital. Two other “critical patients” were hospitalized in Hialeah and three others whose conditions weren’t disclosed had been sent to a Tampa-area hospital. Eight others whose conditions weren’t disclosed were taken off the ship Sunday to hospitals.

The statement did not immediately indicate whether the 14 people had a confirmed coronavirus link.

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez on Sunday ordered a local hospital physician and nurses dispatched to PortMiami to assist medical staff aboard the Coral Princess. The statement said officials also replenished the ship’s oxygen supply after determining it was critically low.

Meanwhile, buses lined up near the cruise terminal Sunday to take passengers showing no signs of the illness to the airport, but the process was slow. The cruise line said it was further delayed by a policy the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued overnight, preventing passengers from being placed on commercial flights.

“Princess Cruises continues to work tirelessly to adjust the repatriation plan to meet the new CDC requirements. This will unfortunately result in further...