Passengers from the MV Hondius are being screened and isolated across several countries after three deaths and nine reported hantavirus cases linked to the ship.
Governments are moving passengers and crew from the MV Hondius into medical screening, quarantine or home isolation after a hantavirus outbreak linked to the Dutch cruise ship left three former travellers dead and prompted international contact tracing.
The last passengers and some crew have now left the vessel after disembarking at Granadilla port in south-east Tenerife. The World Health Organization has reported nine cases connected to the outbreak so far, seven confirmed and two suspected. Three people — a Dutch couple and a German woman — died after travelling on the ship, with two confirmed to have had the virus.
Authorities have also reported new infections among travellers who returned home. An American and a French national have tested positive, while Spain has reported a provisional positive test in one passenger, with definitive results still pending.
The UK has taken 20 British nationals, one German national who lives in the UK and one Japanese passenger to Arrowe Park Hospital in Merseyside for 72 hours of checks and testing. They are expected to continue isolating at home for a further 42 days if cleared to leave hospital. UK officials said none of the group was showing symptoms and described the risk to the public as extremely low.
In the United States, 18 American passengers have returned. Sixteen are being screened at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, while two are in Atlanta, including one passenger with mild symptoms who travelled in a biocontainment unit and is being cared for at Emory University’s special pathogen treatment center. US guidance cited in the report calls for 42 days of self-isolation and monitoring, including daily temperature checks.
European Union guidance is broadly similar, advising returning citizens to undergo medical triage, then self-isolate and monitor for symptoms for six weeks. Dutch nationals who left the ship were flown to Eindhoven and taken directly home, where health officials are expected to check on them daily. In Spain, 14 nationals flown from Tenerife to Madrid are in mandatory quarantine at a military hospital.
France has confirmed a case in a woman isolating in Paris after she developed symptoms while travelling from Tenerife. French authorities have traced 22 contacts. Germany said four people who arrived overnight were initially monitored in isolation at Frankfurt University Hospital before being transferred home for close follow-up by local health authorities.
Canada said four returning passengers in British Columbia have no symptoms but will self-isolate for at least 21 days, with the period potentially extending to 42 days. Two other Canadians are isolating at home in Ontario. Switzerland has reported a positive case in a man who left the cruise in Saint Helena; his wife has not shown symptoms but is isolating as a precaution.
Investigators have not confirmed where the outbreak began. The WHO has previously said the first two cases had travelled through Argentina, Chile and Uruguay on a bird-watching trip that included sites where a rat species known to carry the virus was present. Argentine officials have described that route as a leading hypothesis, but the origin remains unconfirmed.
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