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Unvaccinated Children PCR TEST ONLY NOW? (No Abbott)


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We are sailing on Harmony of the Seas on January 23rd. The 4 adults traveling are all vaccinated however our 2 year old child is currently ineligible for vaccination. Understanding cruising during Covid requires flexibility, we have being doing all our due diligence and research. We found the Abbott at home testing videos online and decided that was the best option for us to avoid going to a doctors office so we ordered them. However, I looked at the healthy sail center today and noticed they changed from accepting unvaccinated children Antigen and PCR test to just PCR only. I was reading online and it looks like the Abbott test is an Antigen test. I’m wondering if anyone else is seeing this and if anyone is going to be surprised by it at terminals or in the app prior to sailing? I just know a lot of places are turning people away unless they have symptoms so thinking it might be harder to get my daughter tested now. Attached you will find two screenshots I took from Royal Caribbean today and one I sent my wife back when we booked. You can see the change in the photos.

Hope this helps anyone else in the same situation and any tips would be appreciated.

Happy Travels!

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4B6AB67E-A4C3-4017-A832-4FC7265B553F.jpeg

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1 hour ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

I wonder how the fact that the PCR test is losing its EUA as of today, will affect the policy of requiring PCR tests for - well, anyone, really.

The only PCR test losing its EUA is the original one.  That one only tested for covid. Since this summer the CDC has encouraged providers to switch to other PCR tests which tested for multiple viruses at once.

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4 minutes ago, smokeybandit said:

The only PCR test losing its EUA is the original one.  That one only tested for covid. Since this summer the CDC has encouraged providers to switch to other PCR tests which tested for multiple viruses at once.

Yes, of course...I wasn't thinking about other PCR tests.  It's just the COVID one.  

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13 hours ago, coryo_cincinnati said:

We are sailing on Harmony of the Seas on January 23rd. The 4 adults traveling are all vaccinated however our 2 year old child is currently ineligible for vaccination. Understanding cruising during Covid requires flexibility, we have being doing all our due diligence and research. We found the Abbott at home testing videos online and decided that was the best option for us to avoid going to a doctors office so we ordered them. However, I looked at the healthy sail center today and noticed they changed from accepting unvaccinated children Antigen and PCR test to just PCR only. I was reading online and it looks like the Abbott test is an Antigen test. I’m wondering if anyone else is seeing this and if anyone is going to be surprised by it at terminals or in the app prior to sailing? I just know a lot of places are turning people away unless they have symptoms so thinking it might be harder to get my daughter tested now. Attached you will find two screenshots I took from Royal Caribbean today and one I sent my wife back when we booked. You can see the change in the photos.

Hope this helps anyone else in the same situation and any tips would be appreciated.

Happy Travels!

B666BF6F-9044-4E94-9D4C-9D5B3A898D4D.jpeg

4B6AB67E-A4C3-4017-A832-4FC7265B553F.jpeg

I saw PCR for unvaxxed children a while ago.  I would recommend that 13-14 days prior to your cruise, at midnight, you look at the CVS website (hope you have some near you), filter for PCR tests only & click on the date that is 2-3 days prior to your cruise (3 is better, so that you have a good shot at getting the results in time), and schedule it as soon as possible.  My CVS is doing 13 days out, so very early Christmas morning DH & DD were on the site trying to get our tests for 1/7.  DH got for himself & older DD antigen tests for 1/7 am, other DD & I had to wait to get Saturday, since my CVS only had appointments til 130pm on the Friday, and we would both be working.

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Definitely try to find rapid PCR for the kids. We don’t have it as an option where we live and went the standard 24-72 hour PCR tests at the pharmacy. We did not receive those results until early morning the day of sailing. Not having the results in hand, we had to find a rapid PCR testing facility in our departure city the night before we sailed. 

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On 12/30/2021 at 8:51 PM, coryo_cincinnati said:

We are sailing on Harmony of the Seas on January 23rd. The 4 adults traveling are all vaccinated however our 2 year old child is currently ineligible for vaccination. Understanding cruising during Covid requires flexibility, we have being doing all our due diligence and research. We found the Abbott at home testing videos online and decided that was the best option for us to avoid going to a doctors office so we ordered them. However, I looked at the healthy sail center today and noticed they changed from accepting unvaccinated children Antigen and PCR test to just PCR only. I was reading online and it looks like the Abbott test is an Antigen test. I’m wondering if anyone else is seeing this and if anyone is going to be surprised by it at terminals or in the app prior to sailing? I just know a lot of places are turning people away unless they have symptoms so thinking it might be harder to get my daughter tested now. Attached you will find two screenshots I took from Royal Caribbean today and one I sent my wife back when we booked. You can see the change in the photos.

Hope this helps anyone else in the same situation and any tips would be appreciated.

Happy Travels!

B666BF6F-9044-4E94-9D4C-9D5B3A898D4D.jpeg

4B6AB67E-A4C3-4017-A832-4FC7265B553F.jpeg


 

Royal accepts this NAAT test at Walgreens as a PCR …….. the “RAPID DIAGNOSTIC TEST (ID NOW)”  

 

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I also recommend the NAAT test at Walgreens. We got our results back in a little over an hour and it was free. I sailed with my unvaccinated 8 year old a few weeks ago and they accepted the NAAT test. If you look at RCL website they say that they accept two tests Moleculer (also called PCR or NAAT) or Antigen

Screenshot_20220105-080414_Chrome.thumb.jpg.5f282375ec29d30bd9126c27397ab827.jpg

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