Proctored test for Princess Cruise lines or Canadians getting covid19 test in Alaska

[Nadia83]

Hi there, 

 

I read a similar thread where Canadians were posting about using azova.com for proctoring of self tests to enter the USA however didn't see if these had been accepted to board a Princess cruise ship. 

 

I will be travelling in Alaska for one week prior to boarding the cruise. I'm being tested in Ottawa prior to leaving but that test will not be valid to board the cruise (too much time has passed). 

 

I've reached out to my travel agent for help who referred me to the Princess website. The website lists a few possibilities for testing however they either don't apply to Alaska or don't apply to Canadians. The doc to go company doing testing at the cruise ports is not available in Whittier, the self test websites that Princess website recommends either don't ship to Canada or are out of stock. They specify that any tests used must have emergency use authorization from the FDA. 

 

I have the btnx rapid tests (the lime green box the Canadian governments are handing out for free). I see that some Canadians have used a company called AZOVA to proctor the test online and it was used for royal Caribbean. Has anyone used this for boarding a Princess cruise? 

 

Also, have any Canadians been able to get the free test at Walgreens? Their website doesn't specify they don't offer the test to non Americans but the language implies they assume it's for Americans. 

 

Thanks for the help! I don't want to miss out on this cruise because I can't find an appropriate COVID test in Alaska. 

 

Nadia

[Fouremco]

Canadians have used Walgreens ever since they started testing. In Whittier, there are no antigen tests available from Walgreens, but you can get a NAAT test. They only do drive-through tests, so you'd need to get a taxi or uber. For more details: https://www.walgreens.com/findcare/covid19/testing?ban=covid_vanity_testing

 

As for proctored self-testing, most of the cruise lines state that they need have an FDA EUA, but in reality, they have been accepting test kits available in Canada. There are many, many posts by Canadians saying that they have had no issues using Canadian kits, but I don't recall specifically if any of the posters were Princess passengers. 

 

You might want to post this on the Princess forum as well, as not all Canadian members come to this forum.

 

I hope that you and your dad have a great cruise!

[turnin50]

The BTNX website does proctored tests approved for travel with their own test kits, I just booked a pre-cruise proctored test with them for Sept.

[Fouremco]

According to this post, @sunviking90 had used a Switch Health proctored test previously and planned on doing so again a couple of weeks later on a Princess cruise. This particular test kit has not received an FDA EUA. Perhaps if he reads this he will be able to tell us whether or not he was successful using a test kit with no FDA EUA.

 

 

 

 

 

[sunviking90]

9 minutes ago, Fouremco said:

According to this post, @sunviking90 had used a Switch Health proctored test previously and planned on doing so again a couple of weeks later on a Princess cruise. This particular test kit has not received an FDA EUA. Perhaps if he reads this he will be able to tell us whether or not he was successful using a test kit with no FDA EUA.

 

 

 

 

 

All the cruises we used the switch health proctored tests on were indeed Princess cruises (Jan, April and May). “He” is a she by the way😊

[Fouremco]

5 minutes ago, sunviking90 said:

All the cruises we used the switch health proctored tests on were indeed Princess cruises (Jan, April and May). “He” is a she by the way😊

Great, this will be very helpful for the OP.

 

Apologies...  

[Nadia83]

Thanks very much! This is making me feel a lot better 🙂