Passengers leave cruise ship after hantavirus death reported

More than two dozen passengers from at least 12 different countries left a cruise ship hit by a deadly hantavirus outbreak on April 24 without contact tracing, nearly two weeks after the first passenger died on board, the ship operator and Dutch officials said on Thursday.

The news raised concerns that the virus could spread as travellers returned home, although experts say the risk to the wider public is considered low as hantavirus isn’t easily transmitted between people. Even so, the Dutch health ministry said a woman who was not on the ship was being tested for hantavirus and being kept in an isolated ward in an Amsterdam hospital after showing symptoms. The woman was part of a flight crew and had contact with an infected passenger on the plane, it said. If the woman tests positive, she could be the first known person not on the MV Hondius to become infected in the outbreak.

Health authorities were monitoring people or trying to trace others who may have come into contact with cruise passengers on at least four continents.

Three cruise ship passengers have died in the outbreak, and several others are sick. Three people, including the ship’s doctor, were evacuated on Wednesday while the ship was near the West African island country of Cape Verde and taken to specialised hospitals in Europe for treatment. The Netherlands-based cruise ship company had previously said the body of the Dutch man who was the first to die on board on April 11 was taken off the ship on the remote South Atlantic island of St. Helena on April 24, when his wife also disembarked. She then flew to South Africa a day later and died there.

The company said Thursday 29 passengers left the vessel at St. Helena, while the Dutch Foreign Ministry put the number at about 40. The company had not previously acknowledged that dozens more people left the ship at that time.

 The first confirmed case of hantavirus in a passenger on the ship was only on May 2, the World Health Organisation has previously said. That was in a British man evacuated from the ship to South Africa from Ascension Island three days after the St. Helena stop. He was tested in South Africa and is in intensive care there.

The people who left the ship at St. Helena to return to their home countries were of at least 12 different nationalities, Oceanwide Expeditions said. It said there were also two people whose nationalities were unknown.

2 British nationals self-isolating Two British nationals who were exposed to the dangerous hantavirus while on a cruise ship before flying back home recently are self-isolating as a precautionary measure, UK health authorities have said.

The UK Health Security Agency said on Wednesday that it is working with the World Health Organisation (WHO) to coordinate the arrival of British nationals to the UK from MV Hondius, which was docked off the coast of West Africa when an outbreak of the virus was reported. Dr Meera Chand, Deputy Director for Epidemic and Emerging Infections at UKHSA, sought to reassure the public that risk from the virus, which is spread through rodent droppings, remains “very low.” the Indian-origin medic said.