France and USA announce cases of hantavirus

Frenchwoman’s health condition worsened overnight. North Americans are not required to quarantine.

A passenger french of the cruise ship MV Hondius had a positive test to hantavirus, announced today the French Minister of Health, Stéphanie Rist.

Among the five French citizens repatriated and placed in isolation in Paris, the health status of one woman, “unfortunately, got worse overnight” and “the tests were positive”, the government official told France Inter radio.

French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has scheduled a meeting for this afternoon on the issue.

Last night it was also known that one of the 17 North Americans removed from the ship tested positive, despite showing no symptoms, US health officials said.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends 42 days of quarantine for those who were on the ship, but each country is free to make a decision, the director general said on Sunday.

But, according to Jay Bhattacharya, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), US passengers will not necessarily be quarantined. They will be in isolation, they will be evaluated and then there will be a decision.

The Americans will first be taken to the University of Nebraska, which has a federally funded quarantine facility, to assess whether they have been in close contact with symptomatic people and their risk levels of spreading the virus.

In France, the Minister of Health announced that all passengers will comply a rigorous period of 42 day quarantine – regardless of exam results.

Em Spain, the two women hospitalized on suspicion of hantavirus had results negatives we are PCR witnesses.

Disembarkation from the cruise ship should end today, Monday. In the next few hours, 24 people will be disembarked and repatriated to Australia and the Netherlands.

After that, the boat – which still has part of the crew on board, including a Portuguese – will not disembark in the Canaries and continues on to the Netherlands, country of origin.