I too had avoided Covid for three years and came down with it the third day of our recent Gem TA.
Was feeling off second day and woke up the next day with a fever of 101 feeling pretty bad.
Concierge called medical center for us and they wanted to see both me and my wife. I tested positive and she was negative. I was prescribed Paxlovid and my wife took it prophylactically as a preventative measure. I was required to isolate in the cabin for five days and she had to wear a mask outside the cabin. Was released from isolation after five days and a negative test. It was quite the procession to get me back to the cabin from the medical center. Returned as far as possible through the crew are with security clearing the way flowed by nurse, then me then somebody fogging behind me. I found out after the fact that my key card had been flagged in case I tried to go anywhere or leave the ship.
The medical center fee for evaluation, antigen test, PCR test, Paxlovid and follow up antigen test was $1,318.00 dollars. Her bill was $1,223.00. So far my personal insurance is covering $245.00 each ( cost of the tests) and the rest is pending with AON trip insurance. Should have their answer on coverage of the balance in a couple weeks.
The only issue I had with the medical center was that they took no vitals (BP, pulse ox, temp, etc.) but when I went back to the medical center a few days later to pick up the final paperwork, it magically had vital signs filled in.
I would probably still go to the medical center. I was pretty sick the first couple of days until the meds started kicking in. We also didn’t want to risk my wife getting sick later in the cruise before we started hitting ports every day. Luckily I only missed the first two ports (Azores and Lisbon). We also had five days in Rome booked after the cruise and didn’t want to risk that with one of us having Covid when we got to Civitavecchia.
