Coronavirus-hit cruise ship held 400 miles off California

San Francisco, March 5 'Grand Princess', a cruise ship with thousands of passengers was barred from returning to its home port of San Francisco on Wednesday and has been held 400 miles off the California coast in the US.

The Daily Mail reported that the ship had previously carried two passengers who contracted coronavirus and one among them died. Currently at least 20 people on the ship have been reported ill. The ship is carrying around 2,500 passengers and normally has around 1,150 crew members, according to npr.org.

The ship was returning to San Francisco from a voyage to Hawaii amid the suspected coronavirus outbreak, the report said.

Two passengers who had travelled on the same ship on a previous voyage last month between San Francisco and Mexico later fell ill and tested positive for the coronavirus. One of the infected two was a 71-year-old man who died on Wednesday. It is California's first fatality from the disease.

The second person is currently in hospital and is said to be "gravely ill", Daily Mail reported.

Eleven passengers and 10 crew members who are currently on the same ship have now reported symptoms that could turn out to be the coronavirus, seasonal flu or the common cold.

It is not clear if the 21 people currently reporting symptoms are among the 62 who were on the Mexico leg of the trip and came in contact with the two infected passengers.

Since the outbreak of the disease, globally, more than 92,000 people have tested positive and 3,100 have died so far. In China, the epicentre of the infection death toll due to the novel coronavirus increased to 3,012 with a total of 80,409 confirmed cases on Thursday.

The US has so far reported around 160 confirmed cases of coronavirus infection and according to USA Today, around 30 of them are in California. California and Los Angeles declared states of emergency on Wednesday. San Francisco, the fourth most populous city in California issued its declaration a week ago.

( With inputs from IANS )