A doctor who has treated passengers for years on the Aida Cruise line in Norway and Germany, was arrested this past week. The 40-year-old man was actually arrested for treating passengers aboard the different sailings due to the fact that he isn’t a doctor. Yes, he is a fake doctor and has been able to get by with fake credentials for around five years.
According to Aftenposten , the man has worked for Aida Cruises since 2014 which has regular calls in Oslo, Norway, as well as Germany. The man, who did not have his name released, was arrested by police in Berlin on Friday.
He arrived in Berlin on Friday after departing from Miami to head out on yet another sailing from Aida Cruise Line. The “doctor” had worked on cruise ships in the Caribbean and has been accused of falsifying the examination papers of numerous passengers and publishing them as an actual physician.
Cruise Line News reports that the man was educated as a nurse, but he had worked as a ship doctor in the cruise industry for the last five years.
He was able to get his false information and papers past a number of people aboard multiple cruise lines in order to work as a doctor. On his paperwork, he falsely claimed to be a specialist in anesthesia and also intensive care.
Aida Cruises, which is owned by Carnival Cruise Line, was not able to offer a true explanation of any kind as to why they hired a person with no credentials or medical school education.
All that is clear is that the cruise line did not conduct a thorough or detailed background check before hiring the man as their on-board doctor. Over time, they continued to fail to check his updated credentials or ever search for any type of background information on him.
Not only does this look bad on the cruise line, but it possibly compromised the the health and well-being of hundreds, maybe thousands, of passengers and crew members over the past five years.
This issue with the fake doctor and Aida/Carnival not looking into his background to see who he truly was has raised a lot of questions. The biggest wonder is whether or not the background checks on other cruise employees were thorough or done at all.
A German newspaper website called Berliner Morgenpost had a statement from the spokesman for the Berlin prosecutor that confirmed the man posing as a doctor did work with “several hundred passengers and board members.”
Hansjörg Kunze, spokesman of Aida Cruises, did release a statement to the newspaper.
“Aida Cruises has according to information by the public prosecutor and the Medical Council suspended the supposed doctor immediately from service and the investigating authorities supported from the outset by forces. We have been deceived by the man fully. The Berlin authorities have taken up the investigation into this case, which we continue to support full course. We ask for your understanding that we are currently unable to comment further pending investigation for us.”
It should be noted that neither the German or Norwegian news sites revealed the name of the man posing as a doctor nor the actual ship in the Aida Cruise Line which he worked on.
Aida Cruises and Carnival Cruise Line are likely going to have to answer a lot of questions about this situation going forward. The man who ended up being a fake doctor and working about their ships deceived a lot of people and put a lot of lives in jeopardy.
[Image by Peter Parks – Getty Images]
