For the second time in 2025, the Holland America Line cruise ship, Eurodam, has reported a norovirus outbreak.
A report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said nearly 150 of the 2,000 passengers reported being ill upon returning to Port Everglades on Saturday.
According to the CDC’s Vessel Sanitation Program (VSP), it’s the ninth voyage that has departed from or docked in Florida this year that resulted in an outbreak — with seven of them confirmed as norovirus. Two of the cruises began in 2024, but ended in January 2025.
Despite being ranked in the top five cleanest cruise lines by the VSP, it’s also the fourth time this year a Holland America trip reported a norovirus outbreak.
The bug is transmitted by “accidentally getting tiny particles of feces (poop) or vomit in your mouth from a person infected with norovirus,” according to the CDC.
“The norovirus is highly, highly contagious,” said Jill Roberts, a University of South Florida public health professor. “If I pick up food and the food is contaminated and I get norovirus on my hands, now I can contaminate all other areas of the cruise ship.”
Norovirus also spreads through contaminated surfaces, water, and food.
“A lot of times it’s the food preparer that is handling the food,” Roberts said. “The biggest thing that we can do there is not work when we’re sick.”
There were 10 crew members on Eurodam that reported being ill upon returning to Fort Lauderdale.
The virus can be avoided by washing your hands with soap and water,as it’s resistant to basic alcohol-based hand sanitizers and wipes.
Roberts says that it also can be avoided on a larger scale by providing “the resources the CDC needs, including the people who can then go onto the cruise ships and give them all the training and expertise that is necessary to stop these outbreaks.”
The second Eurodam outbreak was reported to officials about halfway through a southern Caribbean trip on Feb. 23.
Two days later, the ship was supposed to dock at Willemstad, Curacao, when Curacao’s Ministry of Health, Environment & Nature posted an order on Facebook that translates to “no passengers or crew of the cruise ship MS Eurodam will be allowed to disembark in Curacao,” due to a significant increase in gastrointestinal cases on board.
Eight hours later, the ministry made another post saying the situation no longer represented an imminent danger to Curacao.
Frequent Miler blogger Nick Reyes, who was onboard Eurodam, posted, “Neither of those events were reported to passengers on board; there was never a mention of the possibility of missing a port stop due to the virus.”
The first Eurodam cruise that had an outbreak was also a round trip from Fort Lauderdale between Dec. 30 on Jan. 8.
The New Year’s voyage had 109 passengers and 13 crew members who reported being ill upon return.
They traveled to a majority of the same locations: Curacao, Aruba, Bonaire and Half Moon Cay, Carnival’s private island in the Bahamas.
