The Navy reported Thursday that five more sailors aboard the carrier USS Roosevelt in the Pacific Ocean tested positive for the coronavirus and were scheduled to be flown off the carrier as it makes its way to Guam to port and complete testing of all 5,000 crew members.
“We found several more cases on board the ship,” acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly said at a Pentagon press briefing Thursday morning. “We are in the process now of testing 100% of the crew of that ship to ensure that we are able to contain whatever spread might have occurred there on the ship.”
With only 800 test kits aboard, Modly said a combination of surveillance tests and swab tests will be used to process all the sailors and that more tests are being flown to the carrier.
The five additional sailors who were scheduled to be flown off the ship Thursday are in addition to three sailors removed from the USS Roosevelt Tuesday.
“We are trending higher,” said Modly, acknowledging a recent spike in Navy COVID-19 positive cases, making the service account for more than one-third of all active-duty cases across the Department of Defense.
The Navy confirmed that it has 133 of the department’s 280 active-duty coronavirus positive cases, including 44 members of the Marine Corps. Modly said all eight of the sailors flown off the USS Roosevelt are showing mild symptoms, and there are no hospitalizations.
Modly could not offer an explanation as to why the Navy is suffering more infections other than to say that his forces are stationed all over the world and have high concentrations at naval bases such as those in San Diego and Norfolk.
He also said a “limiting factor” to labs on large deck ships is that they cannot process test results, which must still be flown to land-based laboratories.
The Navy secretary emphasized that the port call will not affect the carrier’s mission, but he did not explain how its Pacific mission could be executed while it is portside in Guam.
“I also want to emphasize that the ship is operationally capable and can do its mission if required to do so,” he said.
In an interview with Reuters Thursday morning, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper indicated that the military will begin to withhold some infection data from the public.
“What we want to do is give you aggregated numbers. But we are not going to disaggregate numbers because it could reveal information about where we may be affected at a higher rate than maybe some other places,” Esper said.
