The head of the World Health Organization has warned countries to prepare for more hantavirus cases after the outbreak onboard the MV Hondius, and thanked Spain for the “compassion and solidarity” it had shown by taking in the stricken cruise ship and evacuating its passengers and crew.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged countries to follow the WHO’s advice and recommendations, which include a 42-day quarantine and constant monitoring of high-risk contacts.

“At the moment, there is no sign that we are seeing the start of a larger outbreak, but of course the situation could change and, given the long incubation period of the virus, it’s possible we might see more cases in the coming weeks,” he told a press conference in Madrid on Tuesday.

  • Mobiuthuselah@mander.xyz
    1012·
    1 day ago

    People contract it by breathing in aerosolized fresh rodent feces and urine. It’s rare to begin with. This is very different from Covid in the way it spreads. I agree it’s good to be prepared with ways to limit its mortality rate in affected individuals, but these news articles are whipping up hysteria in a population that just survived a world pandemic of something that was highly communicable. Hantavirus is not.

        • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish
          41·
          23 hours ago

          The Andes strain, which is what is being discussed, is indeed spreadable person to person.

          Actually is not. . One shit MD-based study concluded this, but all others say no.

          The balance of the evidence does not support the claim of human-to-human transmission of ANDV. Well-designed cohort and case-control studies that control for co-exposure to rodents are needed to inform public health recommendations.

          Then there’s Reddit-Lemmy-Facebook University.

      • Mobiuthuselah@mander.xyz
        210·
        1 day ago

        Most sources say no. From what I understand, there is a variant in South America that is believed to have been previously passed human to human, but that may be influencing media reports to say it can be rather than differentiating that in most of the world that hasn’t happened.

        Edit: I see now that the article talks about the cruise ship having gone to South America. This still wouldn’t necessarily mean that the virus is as transferrable as COVID was, but with the long incubation time, I understand the abundance of caution.