A hantavirus outbreak tied to the Dutch expedition cruise ship MV Hondius has taken another turn, with health officials in British Columbia, Canada confirming a new positive case among passengers who disembarked weeks after the initial cluster emerged in April.
The infected individual is a Yukon resident who is part of a couple self-isolating on Vancouver Island, one of four Canadian passengers quarantining in the region after leaving the vessel. Officials confirmed the patient has only developed mild symptoms, and none of the four people isolating on Vancouver Island have had any interaction with the general public since entering Canada.
This new case pushes the total number of confirmed hantavirus infections linked to the cruise to 11, all of which are among former passengers of the vessel. Three passengers who traveled on MV Hondius have died so far, with two of those deaths formally tied to the virus.
British Columbia’s senior provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, announced that the result returned as a presumptive positive on Friday, meaning it is still awaiting final verification from Canada’s national microbiology laboratory. “Clearly, this is not what we hoped for, but it is what we planned for,” Dr. Henry told reporters in comments carried by Canada’s national public broadcaster CBC.
Dr. Henry also sought to alleviate public concern by drawing a clear distinction between hantavirus and the more transmissible respiratory viruses that have dominated global public health conversations in recent years, including COVID-19, influenza and measles. “It remains one that we do not consider to have pandemic potential,” she added.
In total, six Canadian passengers were on board the vessel when the outbreak was detected. Two are currently self-isolating in private residences in Ontario, while the two couples quarantining on Vancouver Island include one pair from British Columbia and the other from Yukon – the home of the newly confirmed case. To date, none of the other five Canadian passengers have tested positive for the virus.
The MV Hondius departed on its voyage from Argentina on April 1, with the outbreak detected mid-journey. The ship docked in Tenerife, part of Spain’s Canary Islands, less than a week ago to allow all passengers to disembark and enter isolation protocols. The vessel is scheduled to reach its home port of Rotterdam, Netherlands on Monday, where the remaining crew members will leave the ship. The ship’s owner, Oceanwide Expeditions, confirmed that no current staff on board are showing any symptoms of hantavirus infection.
The World Health Organization (WHO) currently recommends a 42-day isolation period for people exposed to hantavirus. Canadian officials initially required exposed passengers to complete just 21 days of quarantine, but Dr. Henry noted that this timeline is now under review and may be extended to align with global guidance.
Hantaviruses are primarily carried and spread by wild rodents, but the Andes strain linked to this outbreak – which the WHO believes passengers contracted while visiting destinations in South America – is capable of spreading between humans. Common symptoms of infection include fever, extreme fatigue, widespread muscle aches, abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea and difficulty breathing. Public health officials have repeatedly emphasized that the risk of a widespread community outbreak from this cluster remains extremely low.