3 people evacuated from hantavirus-infected cruise ship
by Danielle Haynes & Darryl Coote & Paul Godfrey · UPIMay 6 (UPI) -- Three ill people on board a cruise ship with a hantavirus outbreak were medically evacuated from the vessel Wednesday, the World Health Organization said.
WHO Secretary-General Tedros Ghebreyesus said the three passengers were transported from where the cruise ship was anchored near Cape Verde to the Netherlands to receive care. He shared photos of the process on X.
"WHO thanks all those involved," he wrote.
The Dutch government said the evacuees included a 56-year-old from Britain, a 41-year-old from the Netherlands and a 65-year-old from Germany.
The WHO said there were eight cases of illness and/or death linked to the cruise ship, the MV Hondius. Three cases of hantavirus have been confirmed, while five were suspected.
Three people have died in the outbreak.
The ship is expected to set sail for the Canary Islands to allow passengers to disembark, Spanish officials said earlier Wednesday.
The Spanish Health Ministry said in a post on X that it had agreed to "host the MV Hondius in the Canary Islands in compliance with International Law and humanitarian spirit" at the request of the World Health Organization and the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.
It was believed that 14 Spanish citizens were among the 149 British, American and passengers from 20 other countries stranded aboard the Dutch-flagged vessel which is at anchor off the main Santiago island of Cape Verde which on Monday said it would not allow the Hondius to dock on "public health protection" grounds.
The ministry didn't say to which port in the islands the Hondius was headed but said it would depart Cape Verde upon completion of "a thorough examination of the ship" by ECDC officials to identify those who needed to be urgently evacuated from the ship for emergency medical care.
However, it was unclear if the ship would be permitted to dock in the Canaries after the island's president, Fernando Clavijo, posted on X on Wednesday that he would not allow the Hondius to enter without "sufficient information" to guarantee the safety of residents.
"Today I have requested a meeting with [Spanish] President [Pedro] Sanchez due to the lack of coordination and information regarding the cruise ship affected by a hantavirus outbreak. The Canaries always acts with responsibility, but it cannot accept decisions taken behind the backs of the Canary Islands institutions and without sufficient information to the population," he wrote.
Two passengers died during the Hondius' five-week Antarctica-South Atlantic cruise and the wife of one of the deceased died in Johannesburg en route back to her home in the Netherlands. She and a 69-year-old Briton, who is being treated in hospital in South Africa, are confirmed hantavirus infection cases.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a late Wednesday statement that it was monitoring the situation of U.S. travelers onboard the vessel. The State Department was leading "a coordinated, whole or government response," it said, adding that State Department officials have been in contact with the passengers.
"We urge all Americans aboard the ship to follow the guidance of health officials as we work to bring you home safely," the CDC said.
World Health Organization officials said Tuesday said there may have been human-to-human transmission of the virus as they had identified it as the South American Andes strain which, while it originates from rodent droppings in common with other Hantavirus variants, can jump between humans through close direct contact.
Prices for the Oceanwide Expeditions cruise, which starts from Ushuaia in Argentina, the world's southernmost city, taking in the Antarctic Peninsula and the islands of South Georgia, St. Helena and Cape Verde, start from $19,025.
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