Thousands of overseas students coming to Scotland for university from red list countries may have to quarantine on cruise ships.
The Scottish Government is exploring ways to allow more than 5,000 students from the high covid risk countries to come to Scotland to study when term restarts later this summer.
Existing hotels, based around the country, do not have the sufficient capacity to cope with the number of people wanting to come to study.
People heading to Scotland from red list countries currently have to quarantine in a hotel which costs more than £1,750.
If the person tests positive for coronavirus while in isolation then they may need to quarantine for longer.
According to The Sunday Times, discussions are underway between the government and the cruise sector ahead of the uni term which starts in September.
The plan to put students in cruises near universities has been criticised.
Scottish Labour's health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie said: "It looks like the Scottish government is making things up as they go along.
"Having banned people from cruises and banned cruise ship passengers coming ashore in Scotland, they now appear intent on housing thousands of students in close quarters in petri dish-like conditions which risk a huge spread of the virus."
While, Linda Bauld, public health professor at Edinburgh University, said: "Cruise ships pose particular challenges for infection control as they involve shared facilities and enclosed indoor areas where viruses can easily spread.
"There have been a number of well documented Covid-19 outbreaks on cruise ships from early in the pandemic.
"In fact, the first British citizen to die from Covid-19 did so in Japan after becoming infected while in quarantine on the Diamond Princess cruise ship."
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"If ships are being considered as managed quarantine facilities for people travelling to the UK from red-list countries, I'd be very interested to learn how this is to be organised and why ships would be chosen instead of quarantine hotels, for example."
Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: "It is incredible that the SNP are even considering proposals to use cruise ships to quarantine students arriving for the new term.
"The idea of potentially thousands of students being forced into quarantine on a ship for ten days will be a concern to many.
"The introduction of the hotel quarantine system here in Scotland was a botched mess and this idea would appear to face many of the same issues.
"Of course, there will be capacity issues as we manage students arriving from abroad but there must be other alternatives to these draconian proposals.
"These proposals would also be a slap in the face for the cruise sector, which have been stopped from sailing to Scottish ports and are now being considered as temporary student accommodation.
"The SNP need to set out the rationale for these proposals and, if they are to be introduced, what measures are going to be put in place to protect student welfare."
A Scottish government spokesman said: "We are exploring a range of options in order to increase capacity in managed quarantine facilities to meet the forecast demand for international students arriving from red list countries this year."
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