The World Health Organisation confirmed contact tracing has started as it races to find people from the rat disease cruise liner who got off people three people died
Authorities are rushing to track and trace people who were in close contact with the cruise ship at the centre of a rat disease outbreak, after a case was confirmed in Switzerland.
Around 150 passengers, form 23 countries, were on the luxury MV Hondius liner which has been stuck at sea, unable to dock, after three people from the vessel died. A Dutch couple, aged 70 and 69, and German woman died while a British passenger was evacuated to South Africa where he remains in a critical condition.
Health experts confirmed the virus was the Andes strain of hantavirus, which is known to spread between close contacts.
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A 70-year-old Dutch man died on board on April 11 and his body was removed from the ship at St Helena with his 69-year-old wife. Her condition quickly deteriorated on a flight to South Africa and she died on April 26, while test results on May 4 confirmed she was positive for the virus.
Swiss authorities, on May 7, confirmed a case on hantavirus from someone who had been a passenger on the luxury cruise liner, after he visited a hospital in Zurich.
This person had already disembarked and left the cruise before the diagnosis and went to doctors in Switzerland after an email from the ship’s operator, which informed him of the health crisis.
The World Health Organisation confirmed it was working with countries to start contact tracing to minimise the spread of the rat virus.
In a X post, the WHO said: “Swiss authorities have confirmed a case of #hantavirus identified in a passenger from the MV Hondius cruise ship. He had responded to an email from the ship’s operator informing the passengers of the health event, and presented himself to a hospital in Zurich, Switzerland, and is receiving care.
“In line with the International Health Regulations (IHR), WHO is working with relevant countries to support international contact tracing, to ensure that those potentially exposed are monitored and that any further disease spread is limited.”
Hantavirus can spread from animals to humans when people come into contact with infected rodents and their droppings, saliva or urine. This can include breathing in particles from infected droppings and touching infected parts with hands. It can also be contracted through rodent bites but this is very unlikely.
The WHO confirmed three people were evacuated from the cruise ship and taken to The Netherlands for medical care. One of these people was named as British man Martin Anstee, who had been an expedition guide on board the cruise.
People is at least three US states, Georgia, California and Arizona, are being monitored for potential hanavirus infections as they were passengers on the ship who disembarked early.
The luxury cruise ship was stuck off the coast of Cape Verde, west Africa, for three days after it was no allowed to dock on the island nation. Spain later said the liner could dock on the Canary Islands as it was the “closest location with the necessary capabilities”.
Despite this, the president of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, protested this move and said: “I cannot allow [the boat] to enter the Canaries.”
