A New Zealander on board the Diamond Princess cruise ship has tested positive for the coronavirus, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade has confirmed.
In a statement to Stuff, a MFAT spokesperson said the ministry was giving consular assistance to a New Zealander who has tested positive for coronavirus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama, Japan.
No further details were provided due to privacy reasons, the spokesperson said. MFAT was aware of 13 New Zealanders aboard the ship.
The total number of infections from the ship now sits at 20. The ship was docked in the port city of Yokohama, just outside Tokyo, but people who had tested positive were understood to have been transferred to hospitals on land.
The New Zealander who tested positive was one of 10 people to do so in the latest round of testing performed on board.
The latest infections included four Japanese, two Americans, two Canadians, one Taiwanese and one New Zealander. These 10 were in addition to the 10 who tested positive on Wednesday. Most were in their 60s and 70s.
The 3700 stranded on board the ship faced a two-week quarantine in their cabins. There were 2666 passengers and 1045 crew.
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Passengers on board the ship were notified today about the additional positive tests via the cruise ship's PA system.
Food is only available on board via room service, which had led to several delays as drew tried to deliver to over 1,500 rooms.
Face masks will be delivered to rooms today, and small groups of guests will be eventually be able to spend time on open decks to get fresh air.
Those 54 New Zealand citizens and 44 permanent residents on Chinese will spend 14 days in quarantine there.
More tests were pending on 171 others who had symptoms or had contact with a man who was diagnosed with the virus after leaving the ship in Hong Kong, Japan's Health Ministry said.
There are no confirmed cases of the coronavirus in New Zealand.
On Wednesday, New Zealanders who were evacuated from Wuhan arrived at a navy base in Whangaparāoa, north of Auckland.
Those 54 New Zealand citizens and 44 permanent residents on Chinese will spend 14 days in quarantine there.
So far, at least 490 people have died from the virus with the vast majority of deaths occurring in mainland China. According to the BBC, there are also more than 24,000 confirmed coronavirus cases on the mainland.
In Australia, there are now 14 confirmed cases of the coronavirus.
