'Limited' hantavirus outbreak not the start of pandemic, says WHO

"This is not COVID," said the World Health Organization's pandemic preparedness and prevention director Maria Van Kerkhove. 

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GENEVA: The World Health Organization said Thursday (May 7) that a deadly hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship in the Atlantic did not mark the beginning of a COVID-like crisis.

"This is not the start of an epidemic. This is not the start of a pandemic," WHO epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention director Maria Van Kerkhove told reporters. "This is not COVID."'

The WHO warned, however, that more hantavirus cases could emerge, but it expected the outbreak to be limited if precautions were taken.

The fate of the MV Hondius sparked international alarm after three people travelling on it died.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists in Geneva that five confirmed and three suspected cases had been reported overall, including the three deaths.

"Given the incubation period of the Andes virus, which can be up to six weeks, it's possible that more cases may be reported," he said, referring to the rare strain detected aboard the Hondius, which can be transmitted between humans.

His prediction was proved swiftly correct, with the Leiden University Medical Centre in the Netherlands announcing later on Thursday that another patient had tested positive. 

But the WHO's emergency alert and response director Abdi Rahman Mahamud insisted: "We believe this will be a limited outbreak if the public health measures are implemented and solidarity shown across all countries."

RARE DISEASE

Hantavirus is a rare respiratory disease that is usually spread from infected rodents and can cause respiratory and cardiac distress as well as haemorrhagic fevers.

There are no vaccines and no known cure for it, meaning that treatment consists solely of attempting to relieve the symptoms.

A passenger is thought to have contracted the virus before boarding the ship in Argentina and eventually infected others on board as it sailed across the Atlantic.

Three evacuees were whisked away from the ship on Wednesday and a fourth landed on Thursday in Amsterdam, said the vessel's operator, Netherlands-based Oceanwide Expeditions.

"No symptomatic individuals are present on board" the ship at the moment, as it sails toward the Spanish island of Tenerife, it said in a statement.

Two people who returned to the UK from the ship have been advised to self-isolate, the UK Health Security Agency said, adding they were asymptomatic and insisting the risk to the public was "very low".

Officials in Argentina said they planned to test rodents in the coastal city of Ushuaia, from where the ship had set sail on Apr 1.

FIRST CASE

A Dutch man who had boarded in Ushuaia along with his wife died aboard the ship on Apr 11.

The man's body was taken off the ship on Apr 24 in Saint Helena, an island in the south Atlantic where 29 other passengers disembarked, the ship's operator said.

"These guests have all been contacted by Oceanwide Expeditions. We are working to establish details of all passengers and crew who embarked and disembarked on various stops of Hondius since Mar 20," it said.

Ghebreyesus said it had informed 12 countries that its nationals disembarked from the cruise ship on Saint Helena.

Alarm was raised when the deceased man's wife - who left the ship to accompany his body to South Africa - died there 15 days later after also falling ill, with hantavirus confirmed as the cause on May 4.

The couple had visited Chile, Uruguay and Argentina before the cruise, Argentine officials said.

The Dutch woman had flown on a commercial plane from the island of Saint Helena to Johannesburg while she was showing symptoms.

Officials were trying to trace people on that flight, which South African-based carrier Airlink said was carrying 82 passengers and six crew.

A German passenger died on May 2. Her body remains on the ship.

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