Seven cases of deadly hantavirus confirmed or suspected on stranded cruise ship
Two cases of the deadly hantavirus have been confirmed, and five more are suspected among people who were on a luxury cruise ship now held in the Atlantic near Cape Verde, the World Health Organization said in its most detailed update on the outbreak.
Around 150 people are still stuck on the Hondius that was carrying mostly British, American and Spanish passengers on a trip that set off from Argentina in March and is now off the coast of West Africa.
The seven cases included three people who had died, one who was critically ill and three with mild symptoms, the WHO said in a statement late on Monday.
The three fatalities were a Dutch couple and a German national, and a British national was evacuated from the ship from Ascension and is being treated in South Africa, officials have said.
“The atmosphere on board m/v Hondius remains calm, with passengers generally composed”, the ship’s operator, Oceanwide Expeditions, said in a statement late on Monday. It said it was working on getting the passengers screened and disembarked, and was considering sailing to Spain’s Las Palmas or Tenerife.
The U.N. health body reiterated its advice that the risk to the wider public was low from the disease typically spread from infected rodents that only rarely passes between humans.
Cape Verde – an island nation off the coast of West Africa – has asked the ship to stay at sea as a precaution.
Data from maritime analytics provider MarineTraffic shows the ship had been visiting some of the most remote places on Earth, including Tristan da Cunha, an island in the south Atlantic between Argentina and South Africa.
According to company documentation, the Hondius left Ushuaia in southern Argentina in March, on a voyage marketed as an Antarctic nature expedition, with berth prices ranging from 14,000 to 22,000 euros ($16,000 to $25,000).
