Focusing on the cruise industry, this Loss Prevention News supplement covers topics such as the crew risk management programme, the US Disability Act and disabled passengers, legal developments in the USA, the Athens Convention, disembarkation procedures, Legionnaires' disease, special cover for cruise ships and the battle against immigration fines.

The UK P&I Club’s Crew Risk Management Programme, which provides a system of high quality standards for pre-employment medical examinations for seafarers, has grown from strength to strength as it celebrates its fifth anniversary. In the past 12 months, the number of seafarers examined at its network of accredited clinics around the world has been greater than the four preceding years.

The Programme began as a pilot project in August 1996 with several hundred seafarers and three clinics in Manila. The Programme, with a well-developed network of clinics in ten countries, has performed in excess of 30,000 examinations. Work is now going on world-wide to set up clinic facilities in response to Members’ requests.

From its initial investigation, the UK Club found there were huge inconsistencies in the standards used by the clinics for pre-employment medical examinations. What concerned the Club more was the fact that the examination did not extend sufficiently to screen out preexisting conditions that would impact on a shipowner's liability to pay compensation.

The consequences for a shipowner are drastic; exposing him to a potential liability of hundreds of thousands of dollars under the contractual obligation. In the worst case scenario, the civil liability could amount to millions of dollars.

The Club believed it could assist its Members to overcome the problems by designing a universally accepted standard medical examination form, using professionally run clinics. Participating clinics have to be satisfied that no disease or condition is present in crew applicants which could be aggravated by working at sea or which represents an unacceptable health risk to the individual or to others.

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