THE NEW YORK TIMES: What to know about the suspected hantavirus outbreak on an Atlantic Cruise Ship

Hantavirus, a rare family of viruses carried by rodents, is suspected in a deadly outbreak aboard a cruise ship sailing the Atlantic Ocean.

The World Health Organisation said Sunday that three people who had been travelling aboard the vessel, the MV Hondius, had died.

Another person is in intensive care in South Africa, and two crew members with “acute respiratory symptoms” are still on the ship and require urgent medical care, according to the vessel’s operator, Oceanwide Expeditions.

Officials have confirmed hantavirus infection in one person who is hospitalised in South Africa. The remaining five are under investigation.

The vessel was anchored Monday off the port of Praia, in the West African nation of Cape Verde, but had not docked.

Here’s what to know:

Three people died but the risk to the wider public is low

While three passengers died and more might have caught the virus, Hans Kluge, the WHO regional director for Europe, said Monday that the risk to the wider public remained low.

“There is no need for panic or travel restrictions,” the Reuters news agency quoted him as saying.

The three people who died were a Dutch couple and a German citizen, according to Oceanwide.

The first fatality was a 70-year-old Dutch man who died on board the ship on April 11. Nearly two weeks later, on April 24, his body was taken off the ship at St. Helena Island, a British protectorate in the South Atlantic, to be repatriated to the Netherlands, Oceanwide said. The man had experienced a fever, a headache, abdominal pain and diarrhoea.

His 69-year-old wife, who left the ship with her husband’s body, became ill during the return journey and collapsed at O.R. Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, while attempting to fly home to the Netherlands. She was taken to a health facility, where she died.

Then, on May 2, a German passenger died aboard the ship, according to Oceanside.

A British citizen fell ill during the voyage between St. Helena and Ascension Island and was in intensive care in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Monday.

His laboratory results had come back positive for hantavirus, said Foster Mohale, a spokesperson for the National Department of Health in South Africa.

Dr. Ann Lindstrand, a WHO official in Cape Verde, said in an email that a previously suspected new case on the ship was completely asymptomatic at reassessment on Monday evening.

The vessel was carrying 149 people, including 88 passengers and 61 crew members, according to Oceanwide. Seventeen of the passengers are Americans. The company says the ship can hold as many as 170 people in its 80 cabins.

The ship had departed from Argentina and was headed for the Canary Islands

The Dutch-registered MV Hondius departed Ushuaia, Argentina, around three weeks ago for the Canary Islands, Mohale said. The Argentine health authorities in the southern province of Tierra del Fuego, where the ship departed from, said there were no known cases of hantavirus in the area.

Cape Verde was a scheduled stop on the cruise’s itinerary before its planned final destination, Mohale said. As of Monday morning, Cape Verde authorities had not authorized passengers to disembark. Oceanwide said that local officials were deciding whether to transfer the two symptomatic crew members — one Dutch, one British — who remained on board.

Lindstrand said a medical team, including two doctors, a nurse and a laboratory specialist, had been sent to the ship. The remaining two symptomatic patients are stable and not in a critical state, Lindstrand said. “They will hopefully be evacuated tomorrow with an airplane that should be arriving by midnight tonight,” she said in an email Monday evening.

The ship’s itinerary included stops in Antarctica, the Falkland Islands, South Georgia Island, Nightingale Island, Tristan, St. Helena and Ascension, Mohale said.

Oceanwide said on Monday that it was considering sailing to Las Palmas or Tenerife, in Spain, as a “gateway for disembarkation, where further medical screening and handling could take place.”

Oceanwide Expeditions is a Dutch-based cruise operator that has specialized in small-vessel polar expeditions for more than 30 years. The MV Hondius, which has been sailing since 2019, has not previously been detained in port for health or safety issues, according to the European Maritime Safety Agency, which collects data on ship safety.

The hantavirus is a rare disease that is often carried by rodents

Hantavirus is a rare disease typically contracted when people breathe in particles of dried droppings or urine from infected rodents.

It is rare for the disease to spread among people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The Andes virus, primarily found in South America, is the only hantavirus known to spread between people.

From 1993 to 2022, there were 864 recorded cases of the disease in the United States, according to the CDC. Last year, Betsy Arakawa, the wife of actor Gene Hackman, died from the effects of the virus.

Early symptoms are flu-like, including fever, chills, body aches and headaches. As the illness progresses, it can cause shortness of breath and, in severe instances, lung or heart failure. There is no specific treatment for the virus, but symptoms can be treated with intubation, oxygen therapy, fluid replacement and medication, according to the CDC.

Cruise ships are a prime spot for infections to spread.

Hantavirus is rarely associated with cruise ships, but other viruses, like the norovirus, can spread much more frequently at sea.

In March 2025, more than 230 passengers and crew members got sick during a norovirus outbreak aboard a monthlong cruise from England to the Eastern Caribbean, according to the CDC. Norovirus, a gastrointestinal illness, thrives in the confined quarters of a ship. It spreads through person-to-person contact or through contaminated food or water.

According to the CDC, the most common outbreaks at sea involve gastrointestinal illnesses or respiratory infections such as COVID-19 and influenza.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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