Health authorities in several countries are working to track down people who may have come into contact with a hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship that has killed three passengers, according to the Associated Press. The effort, which spans at least 12 countries, began after a passenger died during the voyage but before officials identified the virus as the cause, leaving dozens of travelers already dispersed.
About 140 people remain on the ship bound for the Canary Islands, and none are reported ill, the AP reported. The far more complicated task is reaching those who disembarked at St. Helena — a remote British territory in the South Atlantic — and flew onward. Two men from Singapore who went home via South Africa are being tested and isolated at the National Center for Infectious Diseases. Two Canadians who returned to Ontario have been told to self-isolate, and two British passengers who flew home mid-journey are self-isolating without symptoms, with a small number of their contacts doing the same.
In the United States, Texas public health workers have contacted two residents who left the ship April 24; neither shows symptoms and both are checking their temperatures daily, officials said. Arizona is monitoring one person on a 42-day schedule. California and Georgia also have people who disembarked, though state officials have released few details.
The outbreak is attributed to the Andes virus, a member of the hantavirus family found in South America. Unlike most hantaviruses — which typically spread when people inhale contaminated rodent droppings — the Andes strain has been documented in rare person-to-person transmission. Scientists at Argentina’s Malbrán Institute plan to travel to Ushuaia, where officials believe the first infections may have occurred during a birdwatching trip. They are analyzing the virus’s genetic sequence for any changes that could make it more transmissible.
Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, chief executive officer of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, told the AP that researchers believe people are mainly infectious when they have symptoms, and if the virus spreads, “it may be transmitted through small liquid particles that blow out of an infected person when they talk, cough or sneeze.”
Officials remain confident the outbreak will not become an epidemic, given the virus’s typically limited human-to-human spread. But the rare potential for transmission and the possibility of mutation are driving the worldwide monitoring effort.