British coronavirus couple’s family reveal quarantined pair are struggling with their mental health in Japanese hospital and slam online trolls who accuse them of ‘milking it’ as third Diamond Princess passenger dies
An elderly man from the coronavirus-infected Diamond Princess cruise ship has died, according to authorities.
The latest death was a Japanese man in his 80s, making him the third person to have died from the ship.
The health ministry confirmed the death on its website, days after an elderly couple also died.
The government is facing growing questions about whether it is doing enough to stop the spread of the virus, which originated in China and has killed more than 2,400 there. Tokyo is preparing to host the 2020 Summer Olympics in July.
A third passenger from the coronavirus-infected Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan died on Sunday, according to authorities
Health Minister Katsunobu Kato said he would hold a meeting of experts on Monday and formulate a basic policy for addressing the disease on Tuesday.
Kato apologised on Saturday for allowing an infected woman to leave the Diamond Princess, which has been quarantined in Yokohama since Feb. 3.
The woman came ashore on Wednesday but then tested positive for the disease on Saturday in Tochigi Prefecture, north of Tokyo.
Kato said on Saturday that officials had failed to properly test 23 people who disembarked the ship, and his ministry was trying to contact them to be retested.
The ship is owned by Carnival Corp and was originally carrying some 3,700 passengers and crew representing more than a dozen nationalities.
Some nations have flown their citizens home to undergo additional quarantines. Japanese authorities have allowed some other passengers to leave, prompting concerns they could be spreading the virus in Japan.
There have been 634 infections on the ship, according to national broadcaster NHK. Those cases represent the largest concentration of the illness outside China.
It comes after an evacuation carrying 32 British and European passengers who were on the coronavirus-riddled Diamond Princess landed in Britain.
The amount of people flying back to Britain is less than half of the 78 UK nationals who were trapped on the doomed vessel as officials admitted some refused to get on the plane.
The couple were on the cruise for their 50th wedding anniversary when it was placed into quarantine.
Although they were originally in a hospital just 90 minutes from the coronavirus-stricken cruise ship, Mrs Abel called her son in the middle of the night to say the couple were suddenly being moved to a different ‘three-star’ hospital.
It took seven hours for the family to track down which hospital they had been taken to.