Hantavirus
United States health officials have appealed for calm after one American passenger evacuated from the hantavirus-hit cruise ship MV Hondius tested mildly positive for the Andes virus.
The US Department of Health and Human Services said the passenger only showed mild symptoms, while another traveler was placed in a biocontainment unit “out of an abundance of caution.”
Authorities stressed that the outbreak is not comparable to the global COVID-19 pandemic, with acting CDC Director Jay Bhattacharya declaring: “This is not Covid.”
The MV Hondius, which recently docked in Spain’s Canary Islands after several infections onboard, has recorded three deaths linked to the deadly virus.
Seventeen American citizens aboard the vessel are now being repatriated to the United States on a specially arranged flight.
According to officials, the passengers—most of whom are asymptomatic—will be taken to a specialised medical facility in Nebraska for health assessment and monitoring.
Bhattacharya explained that quarantine measures would depend on each passenger’s level of exposure, saying authorities would “interview them and assess them for risk… if they have been in close contact with somebody who was symptomatic.”
The University of Nebraska Medical Center confirmed that one passenger who tested positive but remains symptom-free will be admitted into its biocontainment unit upon arrival in Omaha.
Other passengers will undergo observation for several weeks, as health experts monitor for possible symptoms similar to those earlier reported among seven Americans who had already left the ship.
The CDC maintained that hantavirus transmission risk remains low because “people are generally only contagious when they exhibit symptoms.”
