Passengers from a cruise ship hit by a deadly hantavirus outbreak were being flown home Monday to more than 20 countries and quarantined, including a French woman and an American who tested positive.
Passengers from the ship began flying home aboard military and government planes Sunday after the MV Hondius anchored in the Canary Islands. Personnel in full-body protective gear and breathing masks escorted the travelers from ship to shore in Tenerife, an effort that continued Monday.
Three cruise ship passengers have died, and six people with confirmed or suspected lotto max second prize ontario cases of hantavirus are being quarantined, according to the World Health Organization. The lab results of the American who tested positive were inconclusive, WHO spokesperson Sarah Tyler said Monday.
Health authorities say the risk to the broader public is low from the first-ever hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship. While there is no cure or vaccine for hantavirus, the WHO says early detection and treatment improves survival rates.
The ship’s captain, Jan Dobrogowski, issued a video message Monday praising passengers and crew for their courage and perseverance, and he called for respect for their privacy.
“I could not imagine sailing through these circumstances with a better group of people, guests and crew alike,” he said.
The jacksonville weather French woman who tested positive for the hantavirus is in intensive care in stable condition at a Paris hospital, French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said Monday. He said four French passengers who returned Sunday have tested negative but remain in isolation at the same hospital.
One of 18 evacuated passengers flown to the U.S. also tested positive for spotify 20 the hantavirus but is not showing symptoms, while another had mild symptoms, U.S. health officials said.
After landing early Monday, 16 American passengers — one of them a British-U.S. dual citizen — were taken to the University of Nebraska Medical Center, which has a federally funded quarantine facility and a biocontainment unit for treating people with highly infectious diseases. They were being assessed to determine if they had close contact with any symptomatic people and their risk levels for spreading the virus.
An American who tested positive for hantavirus on the cruise chip was taken to the Omaha campus’ biocontainment unit and will be tested again. The passenger “is doing well and not having symptoms at this time,” said Dr. Angela Hewlett, the unit’s medical director.
The others taken to Nebraska will be monitored in quarantine for several days. They arrived “in good shape, good spirits,” said Dr. Michael Wadman, the quarantine unit’s medical director.
Two additional American passengers, a couple, arrived Monday at a medical facility at Emory University in Atlanta. One of them has mild symptoms and will be tested for hantavirus.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean, just because someone has symptoms, that they’re going to end up having this illness,” said Dr. Brendan Jackson of the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.
Some public health experts have accused the U.S. government of being slow to respond to the hantavirus outbreak. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. rejected the notion that cuts at his agency had left the U.S. less prepared.
“We have this under control,” Kennedy said Monday, “and we’re not worried about it.”
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