{"id":2260,"date":"2026-05-08T23:02:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T23:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/?p=2260"},"modified":"2026-05-08T23:02:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T23:02:16","slug":"who-officials-downplay-pandemic-risk-from-cruise-hantavirus-outbreak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/?p=2260","title":{"rendered":"WHO officials downplay pandemic risk from cruise hantavirus outbreak"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The deadly hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship doesn\u2019t risk triggering the next pandemic, World Health Organisation (WHO) officials said, downplaying an incident that has raised concern about a new viral contagion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not Covid, this is not influenza,\u201d Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO\u2019s director for epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention, told reporters this week.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an outbreak on a ship. We know this virus. This is not the same situation we were in six years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read:
Hantavirus: Singapore tests two after deadly Atlantic cruise outbreak
South Africa confirms Andes hantavirus capable of human spread<\/p>\n

The Dutch-flagged Hondius is sailing toward the Canary Islands after evacuating three people in Cape Verde on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Three passengers have died, six people have contracted the virus and another two are suspected cases.<\/p>\n

But while WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described it as \u201ca serious incident,\u201d it is not one that represents a public-health threat \u2014 even in the Canary Islands where the passengers will likely disembark.<\/p>\n

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Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organisation (WHO). Image: Bloomberg<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The outbreak has triggered an international response and grabbed global headlines in an echo of the last pandemic, when cruise ships became symbols of how swiftly a pathogen could move through a confined space.<\/p>\n

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Still, hantavirus is less transmissible than the coronavirus and doctors say it\u2019s also less adept at mutating.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cFrankly, if somebody had said to me \u2018Oh, we\u2019re going to see a hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship,\u2019 that would have been the 100th thing I would have thought about,\u201d Emory University epidemiologist Carlos del Rio said at a briefing held by the Infectious Diseases Society of America, citing cruise ship outbreaks of Covid-19, norovirus, influenza. \u201cIt\u2019s not in my bingo card.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hantavirus is a rare infection typically spread through contact with infected rodent droppings or inhaling contaminated dust. Symptoms can take weeks to appear, and severe cases can progress rapidly to respiratory failure.<\/p>\n

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Three suspected #hantavirus<\/a> case patients have just been evacuated from the ship and are on their way to receive medical care in the Netherlands in coordination with @WHO<\/a>, the ship\u2019s operator and national authorities from Cabo Verde, the United Kingdom, Spain and the Netherlands.\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/olQBk6tdGk<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) May 6, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Ship evacuees<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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One of the people evacuated in Cape Verde on Wednesday was the ship\u2019s doctor, who likely was contaminated caring for the passengers, Van Kerkhove said.<\/p>\n

Virologists are racing to locate about 30 passengers who left the ship in Saint Helena, an island in the South Atlantic, and others who might have been exposed to the second cruise participant who died after accompanying the body of her husband off the ship.<\/p>\n

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The 69-year-old Dutch woman traveled from the island to Johannesburg, and briefly boarded a KLM flight bound for Amsterdam on 25 April, before being deemed unfit to travel.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

A cabin attendant from the same flight has been hospitalised and tested for hantavirus, according to Dutch health authorities, who said fewer than 10 people on the flight had close contact with the woman.<\/p>\n

Read:
Evacuated hantavirus patients reach Netherlands as ship sails on
Cruise ship linked to hantavirus outbreak to sail to Canary Islands after evacuations<\/p>\n

The Canary Islands\u2019 government, which oversees health care in the archipelago, has questioned why the vessel needed to come there rather than handling the outbreak and evacuating passengers from Cape Verde.<\/p>\n

\"Hondius,<\/p>\n

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The ship is due to arrive in Tenerife on Sunday. WHO officials said they were confident the risk would be low, and that they were working on a plan for how the passengers and crew would return to their home countries.<\/p>\n

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The vessel will anchor offshore rather than dock in port, Pedro Gull\u00f3n, Spain\u2019s director general of public health, said in a briefing Thursday.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cOnce we know what we are dealing with, if there are no new cases or symptomatic people on board, the process of returning people to their places of origin will begin,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Listen\/read: <\/strong>Hantavirus: Calm urged as SA health teams race to trace contacts<\/strong><\/p>\n