The head of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said Wednesday that three patients with suspected hantavirus cases have been evacuated from an affected cruise ship and are on their way to the Netherlands.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the UN health agency is working with the operators of the Dutch-flagged MV Hondius cruise ship to closely monitor the health of passengers and crew.
“At this stage, the overall public health risk remains low,” he wrote on his X account.
The cruise ship at the center of a deadly hantavirus outbreak and which is stuck of the coast of Cape Verde with nearly 150 people on board was waiting Wednesday to head to Spain’s Canary Islands. Meanwhile, health authorities in South Africa and Switzerland identified a strain of the virus that can be transmitted between humans in rare cases in three cases.
Authorities in Switzerland announced Wednesday that a man who returned from South America and traveled on the cruise ship has tested positive for the virus and is receiving treatment.
