As of this Wednesday, there are 11 positive cases of hantavirus related to the outbreak on the cruise ship MV Hondius. Of these, there are eight confirmed cases ofvirus strain of the Andes, transmissible between humans. There are still two probable and one inconclusive, informs the World Health Organization (WHO).
“On May 13, 11 cases were reported, including three deaths,” said the WHO in a newsletter published on Wednesday evening.
Of these 11 cases“eight were confirmed in the laboratory with an infection with the Andes virus (ANDV), two are probable and one case is inconclusive and is subject to additional analyses,” the organization added.
Two of the eight confirmed cases have died.
A fatality rate (percentage of sick people who die after contracting the infection) of this outbreak is, at this stage, 27%according to the WHO.
There is no vaccine or specific treatment against hantavirus, which can cause acute respiratory syndrome.
All cases so far have been found on board the ship.
O case considered inconclusive concerns a person in the United States, “currently asymptomatic”, according to the WHO.
His test results – a positive test and a negative test carried out in two different laboratories – do not allow us to reach a conclusion.
This American passenger, hospitalized in Nebraska, awaits the results of a new test.
The WHO further considers that the risk is “moderate” for the health of passengers and crew of the ship and “low” for the rest of the world’s population.
O incubation period of the virus is between one and six weeks.
Thus, “investigations are underway to clarify the potential circumstances of exposure and the source of the epidemic outbreak, in collaboration with the authorities of Argentina and Chile”, the WHO also indicated on Wednesday.
Researchers from the Malbran Institute in Buenos Aires, a reference in infectology, should, in the next few days, travel to Ushuaia, in Tierra del Fuego, to capture and analyze rodents there, to examine whether they could be vectors of the hantavirus, particularly its strain from the Andes.
O Andes virus, Transmitted mainly to humans by infected rodents, it is endemic in South America.
According to the WHO, its circulation, as well as human cases, were confirmed mainly in Argentina and Chile. Other cases, as well as related strains, were also detected in Uruguay, southern Brazil and Paraguay.
