The man who investigates sanitation complaints from passengers on cruise ships that sail from U.S. ports reckons the ”two or three” letters he gets a week are good evidence that cruise ship sanitation standards are generally kept, well, ship-shape.
”When you look at the millions of people who are sailing, that`s a pretty small number,” says Randall Peterson, chief of the Vessel Sanitation Program overseen by the U.S. Department of Public Health.
”Our rules are very strict, because cruise ships are considered safe havens for travelers and the standards are much higher than they are for local U.S. restaurants,” he says.
He`s proud that food-related illnesses incurred aboard cruise ships are rarer than at stateside restaurants.
His office conducts frequent surprise inspections of cruise ships and runs twice-a-year training programs for cruise line personnel. The
inspections, more than a white glove test, also review the procedures of a ship`s crew, he says. ”The main thing is that we audit their programs and use the inspection as a training process.”
The Vessel Sanitation Program rates ships on a 100-point scale, with 86 as the minimum passing score. About 20 to 25 percent of the ships inspected do not pass the strict standards, ”but if they do fail, we re-inspect them within a month,” Peterson says.
He says passengers may write to his office to request sanitation reports for a specific ship or a ”green sheet,” which is a briefer compilation of the scores of dozens of ships. Complaints about suspected unhealthy conditions may be sent to the same office.
Write to: Chief, Vessel Sanitation Program, Center for Environmental Health, Suite 107, 1015 N. American Way, Miami, Fla. 33132.
