Coronavirus: 79 more cases aboard Diamond Princess cruise ship as quarantine ends and passengers leave

The disembarkation of nearly 3,000 people is expected to take at least three days, according to the Japanese government

In the first group, some 500 mainly elderly passengers who have tested negative for the virus left the ship after final check-ups with doctors

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Some 3,000 people on the Diamond Princess will begin disembarking from February 19, 2020. Photo: AP

Published: 9:07am, 19 Feb 2020Updated: 7:55pm, 19 Feb 2020

Another 79 cases of the deadly new coronavirus were confirmed on the Diamond Princess cruise ship on Wednesday, hours after passengers began disembarking from the vessel that has been moored off Japan for two weeks.

The latest confirmed cases take the overall number of infections aboard the Diamond Princess to 621.

Passengers began leaving the ship after a controversial quarantine period in Yokohama that raised questions about the Japanese government’s response to the coronavirus outbreak.

Kentaro Iwata, a professor at the infectious diseases division of Kobe University, blasted the on-ship quarantine as a “major failure, a mistake”.

“It is highly likely secondary infections occurred,” Iwata said, adding scepticism from abroad of the quarantine was “only natural”.

He later said in a video published online that he was self-quarantining after a brief visit to the ship, where he raised major concerns about the procedures on board. “It was completely chaotic,” he said.

He said he was so concerned at what he saw on the ship during a brief visit on Tuesday that he has placed himself in a 14-day quarantine to avoid infecting his family.