Three passengers on a Dutch cruise ship suspected of being infected with the potentially deadly hantavirus were flown from the ship in the Atlantic Ocean to the Netherlands today for treatment.
Three people from that ship have died, and the World Health Organization (WHO) says there are eight more cases there, five of which have been confirmed by laboratory testing.
About 150 passengers are in isolation in their cabins on a Dutch ship that has been hit by the outbreak. The MV Hondius, which sent the sick via Cape Verde off West Africa, set sail for Spain's Canary Islands this afternoon. Officials say the rest of the passengers on board are not showing symptoms.
The WHO says the risk to the world's population from this outbreak is low, and the organization's leading epidemic expert told The Associated Press: "This is not the next COVID."
Hantavirus is a rare disease transmitted by rodents that is usually spread when people inhale contaminated rodent feces.
According to two officials, the leading hypothesis of the Argentine government is that the Dutch couple, who have since died, contracted the virus before boarding, while birdwatching at a garbage dump in Argentina, the country from which the ship departed on April 1.
Before the ship was cleared to continue its journey, three patients were evacuated today "with maximum security," said Cape Verde's health director, Angela Gomes.
Cape Verde is located 725 kilometers off the west coast of Africa.
The body of the German passenger will be brought to Spain's Canary Islands, where the ship will be accepted, a WHO official told the AP.
"The Cape Verdean authorities were unable to take care of the body and cremate it. That's why it's being kept in a cold room on the ship," said Anne Lindstrand, WHO representative in Cape Verde.
The WHO has not yet confirmed whether the traveler was a confirmed case of hantavirus.
The WHO had previously confirmed three cases and five suspected ones.
Anne Lindstrand, the WHO representative in Cape Verde, said in a telephone interview that a sample taken from a third patient evacuated from the ship was still being tested.
"So far, out of all the cases linked to this ship - eight in total, we now have five confirmed by laboratory testing for the Andes virus," she said.
Two passengers abandoned ship on islands in the South Atlantic and traveled to South Africa. One died and the other remains hospitalized.
Health officials in South Africa have identified 62 people - airline passengers, airport workers, healthcare workers, hospital cleaners, port of entry officials and others - who may have been in contact with the two patients.
So far, officials have located 42 of those people, and none have tested positive for hantavirus. However, some of the 20 people still being sought may have traveled to other countries, the Health Ministry said in a report.
A small plane evacuating two patients with suspected hantavirus infection from a ship off Cape Verde is stopping at an airport in the Canary Islands to refuel, Spain's Health Ministry said.
Samples taken earlier from patients who have now been evacuated from the ship have been examined and have also been confirmed to be of the Andean type, the WHO told reporters today.
The WHO says that the Andean virus is found in South America, primarily in Argentina and Chile, and that it can spread between people, although this is rare and only possible through close contact.
The ship, which is leaving Cape Verde tonight, received medical reinforcements after its doctor fell ill and was evacuated, Anne Lindstrand, WHO representative in Cape Verde, said at a briefing.
"A doctor from the WHO... will take care of the patients if there are more cases on the ship," Lindstrand said.
The World Health Organization's leading expert on the outbreak told the AP that the risk to the general public is low and that the Andean type of hantavirus is known - even though the WHO has never seen a hantavirus outbreak on a ship.
"This is not the next Covid, but it is a severe infectious disease," said Maria van Kerkhove. "Most people will never be exposed to this," she noted.
For those on board, access to clinical care is important, she said, because infected people can develop "severe acute respiratory distress" and require oxygen or mechanical ventilation. The incubation period for hantavirus can be from one to six weeks or more, she added.
Two Argentine officials investigating the origins of a hantavirus outbreak on a ship that set sail from southern Argentina say the government's leading hypothesis is that a Dutch couple contracted the virus while birdwatching in the city of Ushuaia before boarding. They said the couple visited a landfill while birdwatching where they may have been exposed to rodents that carry the infection.
Previously, authorities said that Ushuaia and the surrounding province of Tierra del Fuego had never had a case of hantavirus.
The company Oceanwide Expeditions, which owns the ship, says that infected people are being transported by specially equipped planes to "places that can provide specialized care and appropriate medical examination."
A Dutch hospital has confirmed that it will take in one of the people, and German authorities say they are preparing to take in another from the Netherlands.
The Dutch company says two of the medically evacuated people are “in serious condition.” The third has no symptoms but was “closely associated” with a passenger who died on May 2.
The company also says it is "expanding medical care on board with two infectious disease doctors, who arrived by plane from the Netherlands today."
The Dutch University Medical Center in Leiden says the ward where the patient will be examined is well prepared.
In a statement posted on its website, the hospital said: "In addition to patient isolation rooms, all protective equipment is available for our staff. Treatment is taking place in strict isolation, respecting the current protocols. LUMC has specialized isolation facilities."
She reassures others at the hospital that patients or visitors "are at no risk of infection. You don't need to take any special precautions. You can continue with your visits as usual."
In Germany, the University Clinic in Düsseldorf said that one of three passengers evacuated from the ship and being flown to the Netherlands, who had been in contact with one of the hantavirus cases on board, will be brought to the hospital for testing tonight.
The statement said the person would be brought to Düsseldorf from a Dutch airport with the help of specialists from the city's fire department.
The hospital emphasized that the patient is asymptomatic and that the testing is a precautionary measure.
The arrival of a ship carrying the infection in the Canary Islands "will not pose any risk to the public," said Spanish Health Minister Monica Garcia.
She said the ship would arrive at a secondary port on the island of Tenerife, and that about 140 passengers and crew would be sent to their home countries from a nearby airport.
Garcia said the European Union's civil protection program would oversee this.
The 14 Spaniards on board will be transported to their country by military plane, where, if necessary, they will be placed in quarantine.
The regional president of Spain's Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, said today that the ship "Hondius" had requested permission to dock on the island of Tenerife on May 9th.
Clavijo, however, expressed surprise that passengers were forced to "travel for three days" instead of flying home from the airport in Praia, Cape Verde.
He complained that central authorities in Madrid had not informed him of the details of the circumstances on the ship, which limited the ability of local health officials to prepare for his arrival.
"We don't know the status of all the passengers yet," he said, adding that "there is no protocol for that."
Oceanwide Expeditions said on Tuesday evening that two specialist aircraft were flying to Cape Verde to evacuate two people in urgent medical need and one person who was travelling with a German woman who died on board on Saturday. They were due to be flown to the Netherlands.
The WHO said the ship had a voyage plan across the South Atlantic Ocean that included stops at the Antarctic mainland and the remote islands of South Georgia, Nightingale, Tristan da Cunha, Saint Helena and Ascension.
The cruise line has released only some details about two stops: St. Helena, where the body of a Dutch man suspected of being the ship's first case of hantavirus was unloaded. His wife also left the ship on St. Helena and flew to South Africa, where she died.
The company said a British man was later evacuated from the ship on Ascension Island and taken to South Africa, where he is in intensive care.
The company did not say whether other people abandoned the ship at those or other locations.
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