WHO warns hantavirus response continues after evacuation of MV Hondius passengers

GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) — A member of the MV Hondius cruise ship crew who disembarked in Tenerife and was repatriated to the Netherlands was confirmed Friday as a new hantavirus case, the World Health Organization (WHO) said. "Today, the Netherlands confirmed an additional case among a crew member who disembarked in Tenerife, was repatriated to the Netherlands and has been isolating since then," World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Friday, adding that there were now 12 suspected and confirmed cases in total, including three deaths. The crew member has since been taken to hospital, Dutch authorities said. The Andes virus is the version of hantavirus that can jump from human-to-human.

Rotterdam: The hantavirus-hit cruise ship MV Hondius was due to dock in Rotterdam on Monday morning for ​disinfection, with Dutch authorities preparing quarantine arrangements for the ​25 crew members and two medical staff remaining on board.Local authorities said quarantine facilities had ​been set up for some of the non-Dutch crew, though it was not clear yet if they would stay there for the full recommended 42-day quarantine period.Also Read: One Canadian tests positive for hantavirus, BC officials sayThe Dutch-flagged luxury cruise ship had been carrying around 150 passengers and crew from 23 countries when a cluster of severe respiratory illnesses among passengers ‌was first reported ⁠to the ⁠World Health Organization on May 2.Three people - a Dutch couple and a German national - have died since the start of the outbreak.NOTHING LIKE COVID, SAYS WHO The vessel, ​operated by Oceanwide Expeditions, had been stranded off Cape Verde, its intended final destination, earlier this month after authorities barred passengers from going ashore ​due to the outbreak. The WHO and the EU asked Spain to manage the evacuation at the Canary Islands, after which the ship departed for Rotterdam with a skeleton crew and two additional medical staff.Hantavirus is primarily spread by rodents but can be ​transmitted between people in rare cases and after prolonged, close contact. Incubation can last about ⁠six weeks.Crew, ‌passengers who already left the ship and people in contact with them have been quarantined in several ​countries around the world.The ​current outbreak involves the so-called Andes virus, which has circulated in Argentina and Chile for decades. ⁠Ship samples show no meaningful variation in the virus, the European Centre for ​Disease Prevention and Control has said.On Friday, the WHO revised its case count to 10 ​from 11 after an inconclusive U.S. case tested negative. As of May 15, there were 10 WHO reported cases - eight confirmed and two probable - including the three deaths.British Columbia's government said on Saturday one Canadian, who had been a passenger on the Hondius, had also tested positive for hantavirus. The WHO said on Sunday it was waiting for official updates but that this would make it 11 cases.It said earlier this month more cases were expected to emerge from the outbreak but stressed that the situation was ‌nothing like COVID and did not constitute a pandemic.Due to the long incubation period, the search for new cases could continue for months, testing authorities' post-COVID communications playbook.Also Read: Demand for cruises appears undimmed despite hantavirus and other onboard outbreaksThe WHO recommends monitoring and quarantining high-risk contacts ​for 42 days ​after exposure, while advising low-risk contacts ⁠to self-monitor and seek medical care if symptoms develop.ROTTERDAM CITIZENS NOT WORRIED ABOUT PANDEMIC RISKSome Dutch citizens expressed some concern about the arrival of the MV Hondius in Rotterdam, fearing people might not follow the quarantine rules, but told Reuters they didn't expect a ​new pandemic."What is concerning to me is how well will people ... stay in quarantine," 35-year-old Rotterdam resident Claudia Eduardo said. "Because we know during the pandemic a lot of people didn't abide to the rules." 18-year-old Aleks Mladenovic said it had been scary at first to hear about the hantavirus outbreak, but after doing research he felt more at ease. "It's not a new thing. We'll probably figure something out and get on top of it again," he said. "I am not worried at all."

A rodent-borne virus with a scary name. A mid-ocean cruise ship in quarantine. Several people dead and more falling sick. It is no wonder that an outbreak of the Andes strain of hantavirus on a luxury liner in the Atlantic has revived some Covid-era trauma and panic online. That has presented a dilemma to health officials: how to communicate quickly and clearly about a virus which is not new and unlikely to cause a pandemic, but where knowledge gaps remain — without inadvertently fomenting fear. “Hantavirus thread incoming,” posted the health department of Illinois state in the US earlier this week about a risk-free case unrelated to the MV Hondius cruise ship outbreak. “But you have to promise to read this whole thread before panic-texting your group chat. Deal?” In interviews with Reuters, half a dozen health officials said they were trying to learn from mistakes around Covid, providing information on hantavirus with more empathy while addressing uncertainties and tackling falsehoods. “We spend half of our time discussing how we will communicate,” said Gianfranco Spiteri, emergencies lead at the EU’s European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. During Covid, many governments were slow to react or in denial, public messaging was sometimes confusing and contradictory, restrictions and vaccine rollouts were applied differently around the world, and misinformation and politicisation proliferated. That helped fuel modern mistrust of institutions. For example, faith in public health institutions declined in 20 of 27 EU countries between 2020 and 2022, one study showed. Juggling the communications Spiteri and others at the forefront of the hantavirus response spoke about the need to balance explanations of why it is a serious global health event with reassurances that risks to the public are low, and honesty over the open questions about a virus that has rarely spread among humans before. “There are people who say we are overdoing it, and on the other extreme, that were not doing enough,” he said. “We always base our messages on the evidence we have.” Personnel in hazmat suits walk near a plane carrying passengers evacuated from the cruise ship MV Hondius, which was affected by a hantavirus outbreak, after it landed at the Eindhoven Air Base in Eindhoven, Netherlands on May 12, 2026. — Reuters From a look at social media, their efforts are still a work in progress, with many people needlessly fretting about a return to lockdowns, social distancing and masks. “We have kind of lost perspective,” said Gustavo Palacios, a professor at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in the US who is originally from Argentina and a hantavirus expert. An outbreak can be a major public health event deserving attention and action, but without becoming a pandemic, he noted. Some posts online falsely present hantavirus as a bigger existential threat than Covid, or promote protections like the ivermectin anti-parasite drug, vitamin D and zinc without scientific evidence. False conspiracy theories are popping up too — that it is a side effect of the Pfizer vaccine or a hoax to boost pharmaceutical profits. Sander van der Linden, a psychology professor at England’s University of Cambridge and misinformation expert, said the public needed more support in how to interpret information, including potentially showing them conspiracy theories they may face in the event of an outbreak. “We need to do more preparatory work to create resilience in the population,” he said. As of Thursday, there had been three deaths from 11 reported hantavirus cases in the outbreak, all people who had been on board the Hondius. Dozens of other passengers are being monitored as they return to around 20 countries. A bus carrying passengers caught up in the MV Hondius hantavirus outbreak, arrives at a purpose-built quarantine facility located on the outskirts of the Western Australian city of Perth on May 15, 2026. — AFP Unlike Covid, there are established measures to control hantavirus’ spread, officials said. The strain has circulated in parts of Argentina and Chile for decades and the ship samples show no meaningful variation from that virus. “I’m definitely seeing improvements,” said Gabby Stern, former head of communications at the World Health Organisation (WHO) until September last year, referring particularly to sharing what you know when you know it. “It seems like the public health community has absorbed crucial lessons, although not all of them.” ‘Emotional reaction’ to cruise ship The WHO was quick to reassure the public, holding regular press conferences, issuing alerts and tackling misinformation in social media Q&As since the outbreak was disclosed on May 3. WHO chief Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus even took the unusual step of an open letter to the people of Tenerife, where the Hondius docked on Sunday. “But I need you to hear me clearly: this is not another Covid,” he wrote. “The current public health risk from hantavirus remains low. My colleagues and I have said this unequivocally, and I will say it again to you now.” Director-General of the World Health Organisation Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus looks on, after cruise ship MV Hondius arrived at the port of Granadilla de Abona and its passengers are transferred by buses to airports on the island, in Tenerife, Spain, May 10, 2026. — Reuters Some started more slowly: in the US, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention put out its first information on May 8, five days after the news broke, but has since increased the pace of communications. “One of the things this is teaching us is a lesson we should have learned from Covid: what we say is really important,” said Michael Osterholm, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota. The cruise ship hantavirus narrative has not helped, echoing the infamous outbreak on the Diamond Princess docked off Japan early in the Covid pandemic in 2020 — where 14 people died and nearly a quarter of the 3,000 passengers and crew became infected. “The whole cruise ship thing is a very significant memory from the beginning of Covid,” said Krutika Kuppalli, associate professor of medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Centre. “There’s an emotional reaction that is stirring people.” The resemblance was not lost on Laura Milln, 40, in Tenerife, as passengers began to disembark at the beginning of this week under strict infection-control measures. Seeing WHO boss Tedros arrive on the island with Spanish officials to help oversee the hantavirus response took her back. “It gave me the impression that this isn’t just the flu, otherwise all these people wouldn’t be coming,” she said at a playground, adding that overall she understood their involvement helped ensure the right measures.

41 People In US Under Monitoring For Hantavirus: CDC Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times, Forty-one people are under monitoring in the United States for hantavirus, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on May 14. Most of those being monitored were at one time on board the MV Hondius, a cruise ship that experienced an outbreak of the disease after it sailed from Argentina on April 1 to remote locations such as Antarctica. Eighteen people were flown from the ship recently to medical facilities in Nebraska and Georgia for quarantining during the incubation period for the virus, which is up to 42 days. Some other individuals left the ship before the hantavirus outbreak was detected and are at home in states such as Arizona and California. The third group is composed of people who were exposed to hantavirus during travel because they came close to cruise ship passengers, particularly on planes, Dr. David Fitter, a CDC official, told reporters on a call. Eleven Hondius passengers worldwide have been confirmed or are suspected to have contracted hantavirus, according to the World Health Organization. Three people who were on board and either tested positive or showed symptoms of the virus, such as fever, have died. Humans typically contract hantavirus from infected rodents, but person-to-person transmission is believed to have occurred on board the vessel. “Epidemiological investigations continue to better define epidemiological links between cases and exposure factors on the ship, as well as to try to understand the potential source of exposure,” the World Health Organization said in a statement on May 14. No mandatory quarantine orders have been imposed as of yet in the United States. “We are working closely with passengers and public health partners to ensure monitoring and rapid access to care if symptoms develop,” Fitter said. “Our goal is to work with them and alongside them, building plans based on their specific situations to protect the health and safety of passengers and American communities. We understand that these passengers have already been through a difficult experience. This coordinated approach reflects our respect for them as partners in keeping themselves and their communities safe.” Kansas officials said earlier Thursday that three residents who were not on the Hondius were exposed to a person with hantavirus. The three are being monitored, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. Other states, including Maryland, New Jersey, and Washington state, have said residents were possibly exposed on flights. The CDC says the risk to the public is low, with hantavirus transmission believed to only occur through close contact with infected people or their bodily fluids. Tyler Durden Fri, 05/15/2026 - 07:20

The European Union’s health agency (ECDC) said on Wednesday there was nothing to suggest that the Andes strain of hantavirus had mutated following a deadly outbreak of the illness on a cruise ship. The deaths of three passengers from a rare hantavirus outbreak on a cruise from Argentina to Cape Verde sparked international alarm. Seven other passengers are confirmed to have the virus, including a French woman in a critical condition, while an eighth case is considered “probable”, according to an AFP tally. All of the passengers have been evacuated and are now in quarantine. “Preliminary investigations based on the whole genome sequencing that is available to us suggest that there are no indications that this virus is acting any differently from the known virus circulating in some regions of the world,” Andreas Hoefer, of the Stockholm-based European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, told journalists. “All sequences obtained to date are virtually identical, which means that there is likely only a single transmission event from an infected animal to a human,” Hoefer, a microbiologist and molecular epidemiologist, added. The disease is usually spread from infected rodents, typically through urine, droppings and saliva. Laboratory testing in South Africa and Switzerland confirmed the virus to be the Andes strain — the only hantavirus strain known to pass between humans. There are no vaccines or specific treatments for hantavirus. Both ECDC and World Health Organisation guidelines include a 42-day quarantine and constant monitoring of high-risk contacts because the incubation period can take six weeks. “Due to the long incubation period, it is still possible that more cases among the passengers who are now actually in quarantine will occur,” ECDC director Pamela Rendi-Wagner said. “This cannot be excluded.” Gianfranco Spiteri, ECDC’s head of global epidemic intelligence and health security, said the risk of transmission was greatest for those who showed symptoms of the illness. But he acknowledged that people might be contagious in the first couple of days before symptoms appear. “So in terms of taking a preventive and highly precautionary approach, we recommend, for example, that contact tracing should be done for two days before [the] onset of symptoms as well,” he said.

MADRID, Spain (AFP)—World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Tuesday, "our work is not over" to contain hantavirus after evacuations from a cruise ship hit by a deadly outbreak of the illness. The fate of the MV Hondius has sparked international alarm after three passengers died in an outbreak of the rare virus, for which no vaccines or specific treatments exist, with a Frenchwoman also in a critical condition. Yet health officials have stressed that the global public health risk is low and rejected comparisons to the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. "There is no sign that we are seeing the start of a larger outbreak," Tedros told a joint news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez in Madrid after overseeing the evacuation in Spain's Canary Islands. "But of course the situation could change, and given the long incubation period of the virus, it's possible we might see more cases in the coming weeks," Tedros said of the Andes variant, the only one known to be transmissible between humans. Among living patients, all of whom are passengers or crew of the ship, seven cases have been confirmed and an eighth is listed as "probable", according to an AFP tally of official figures. The affected nationalities include the United States, Britain, France, Spain, Switzerland and the Netherlands. One of the five French passengers flown back from the ship was Tuesday in intensive care on a ventilator battling a "severe" case of the rare disease, according to Dr Xavier Lescure. She was older than 65 and had pre-existing conditions, the doctor told a press conference at the health ministry, without elaborating. More than 120 passengers and crew on the MV Hondius were flown out from Spain's Canary Islands on Sunday and Monday, and countries have adopted different health measures for their returning evacuees. Most have followed the WHO's guidelines, which include a 42-day quarantine and constant monitoring of high-risk contacts because the incubation period can take six weeks. - 'Follow the advice' - According to the Dutch authorities, the 26 passengers who landed back on Sunday on the first flight from the Canary Island of Tenerife to the Netherlands had tested negative. All 26 underwent "thorough medical screening", the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment said Tuesday, and despite the negative tests must quarantine. Two more repatriation flights landed later in the Netherlands, carrying 28 more evacuees who will also undergo isolation. Tedros said he hoped countries would "follow the advice and recommendations we are making", but acknowledged that nations were free to decide their own health protocols. Insisting that his government had the situation "under control", French President Emmanuel Macron called on Tuesday for strong European coordination with the World Health Organization, while speaking at a summit in Kenya. The MV Hondius presented diplomatic challenges as different countries negotiated over who would receive it and treat its passengers. Cape Verde refused to receive the ship, which remained anchored offshore of the capital Praia as three people were evacuated to Europe by air last week. Spain allowed the vessel to anchor off the Canary Islands for the evacuation of passengers and crew on Sunday and Monday, but the Atlantic archipelago's regional government fiercely opposed the measure. Defending his government's policy, Sanchez said the "world does not need more selfishness or more fear. What it needs are countries that show solidarity and want to step forward." The MV Hondius left the island of Tenerife with a skeleton crew on Monday and will be disinfected upon arrival in the Netherlands on Sunday. Hantavirus spreads from the urine, faeces and saliva of infected rodents and is endemic in Argentina, where the MV Hondius set sail on April 1 for a cruise across the Atlantic Ocean to Cape Verde.