If all you wanted for Christmas was a cruise, think again. Most of the world’s major cruise lines have suspended operations until Dec. 31, extending their existing collective “pause” in North American operations for at least another month beyond previously established cancellation dates.

The list of participating – or non-participating to be more accurate – cruise lines includes all Carnival Corp. brands (including CCL, Princess Cruises, Holland America Line, Seabourn, Costa and Cunard), MSC Cruises, Royal Caribbean Group (including Celebrity and Silversea) and Norwegian Cruise Line brands (including NCL, Oceania, and Regent Seven Seas).

The move comes despite the introduction of a new “framework” for sailing issued by the US Center Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that effectively ended the agency’s no-sail order that had been in effect until Oct. 31.

However, as Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings president and CEO Frank Del Rio recently pointed out at the recent Seatrade 2020 Virtual conference, cruise lines can require up to 60 days to stand up a vessel for sailing. “It’s not like turning on a light switch,” he said.

This seems particularly true in light of the CDC’s new framework formula to allow the resumption of carrying passengers, which requires cruise companies to demonstrate they have procedures for testing, quarantining and isolating passengers and crew, as well as building test labs on all ships, plus making their own arrangements to isolate or quarantine passengers on shore if needed.

Additionally, before being allowed to sail, cruise lines will have to conduct mock voyages with volunteers playing passengers who get sick, the CDC said.

Clearly this will not happen overnight; in fact, it could take months, a CDC spokesperson speculated.

For its part, the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), which represents 95% of global ocean-going cruise capacity, said its members (including all the aforementioned cruise lines) would use the remainder of 2020 to “prepare for the implementation of extensive measures to address COVID-19 safety with the guidance of outside public health experts and the CDC.”