Spanish government confirms new case of hantavirus
The Spanish government said Monday it had confirmed a new case of hantavirus linked to the MV Hondius cruise ship, which became the center of an outbreak that killed three people earlier this month.
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A Spanish national who was in preventive quarantine in a Madrid hospital tested positive for the virus, the Health Ministry said in a statement.
The new case involves “close contact” with someone linked to the initial outbreak. The patient who tested positive was placed under clinical surveillance and in isolation at Gómez Ulla Hospital, according to the Ministry of Health.
The patient’s positive case was detected during periodic testing of contacts of people associated with the outbreak. Following the positive test, the patient was transferred to the high-level isolation unit of Gómez Ulla Hospital and placed under specialized medical supervision, the press release continued.
Hantavirus is endemic in parts of South America but remains very rare in humans and has never before been recorded on a cruise ship. Global and U.S. health authorities have consistently tried to allay fears of a broader outbreak.
The Spanish Ministry of Health said that the latest recorded case does not change the risk to the general public, nor the epidemiological response measures in place, as the case involved a person already in their activated isolation system.
The incubation period for hantavirus can be up to six weeks. There have been no new deaths since May 2, when the outbreak was first reported to the World Health Organization.
Twenty crew members and two medical staff disembarked from the cruise ship in the Netherlands last week, Oceanwide Expeditions said. The cruise ship’s arrival ended a seven-week, 8,500-mile journey that was marked by as many as 11 infections and three deaths from the rare disease.
Most of the passengers, including 18 Americans, are in quarantine in their home countries.
