During the morning of this Tuesday, May 5, the contagion of hantavirus registered on board the MV cruise Hondiuswhich left from the city of Ushuaia, Argentina, became especially relevant after confirming three deaths associated with this respiratory infection which can cause diseases serious and potentially mortal.
Given this situation, the spokesperson for the Spanish Society of Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC), Maria Velascostressed that transmission from person to person is exceptional” and that “we must be calm and follow the usual recommendations” regarding the family of viruses transmitted mainly by wild rodents.
Therefore, after the World Health Organization (WHO) indicated that human-to-human transmission may have played a role in the outbreak, the Government of Spain announced that he would decide scale of the MV cruise Hondius after experts in the infectious diseases They will inspect the luxury ship.
“The risk to the general public is low. This is not a virus that spreads like the influenza or like the COVID-19. It’s quite different,” he said. Maria Van Kerkhovehead of epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention at the World Health Organization, at a press conference in the city of Geneva, Switzerland.
Where is the MV Hondius cruise ship heading?
According to what was stated by Maria Van Kerkhove, head of preparation of the World Health Organization, the MV cruise ship is expected Hondiusaffected by an outbreak mortal of hantavirus, navigate to the Canary Islandsa Spanish archipelago of volcanic origin located in the Atlantic Ocean, very close to the northwest coast of Africa.
Faced with this scenario, Spain indicated that infectious disease experts would investigate the ship before any decision was made about its destinationsince, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, this virus is transmits mainly to humans inhalation of particles of urine of mouse.
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At the same time, the World Health Organization (WHO) also reported that some of the people who had become ill could have infected for human-to-human transmission, although he warned that the cruise ship still had to undergo a complete investigation and that this form of transmission was still infrequent.
“We know that some of the cases had contact very narrow each other and certainly cannot be ruled out transmission from person to person,” Van Kerkhove stated, because two of the victims were a couple Dutch and had been traveling through South America before boarding and sharing a cabin heading to Spain.
This is known about the MV Hondius
According to the American newspaper The New York Timesthe MV cruise Hondiusflag Dutchwas anchored off the coast of Cape Verdewhile health authorities worked hard to find a way to evacuate to the sick who were on board (two confirmed and five suspects).
This is because the MV Hondius started from Argentina in early April with 150 passengers and crew members. However, the Cape Verde authorities did not allow the sick to disembark, so the ship is now heading to the Canary IslandsSpanish territory located 985 kilometers to the northeast from Cape Verde.