Virus-hit cruise ship sails to Spain as evacuees reach EU safely

Rising health concerns

The outbreak aboard the MV Hondius has raised international concern after three passengers died from the virus. However, World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stressed that the situation is not comparable to the Corona virus pandemic.

Passenger Ruhi Cenet, a Turkish travel vlogger, said the voyage turned chaotic after the captain announced on April 12 that a passenger had died, initially believed to be from natural causes. He criticised the ship’s response, saying the threat was not taken seriously enough.

Emergency evacuations

The WHO confirmed that emergency teams evacuated three people from the vessel on Wednesday, including two sick crew members and another individual exposed to a confirmed case. The ship later departed from its anchorage off Cape Verde toward Spain’s Canary Islands.

Medical evacuation flights later transported passengers to the Netherlands and the Canary Islands. One evacuee was transferred from Amsterdam to a hospital in Dusseldorf, Germany, after contact with an infected person.

Spanish officials stated that one medical aircraft experienced a “broken isolation bubble,” requiring a replacement plane for continued transport.

Rare Andes virus strain

Health experts confirmed that the virus detected on board was the rare Andes hantavirus strain, the only form known to spread between humans.

The WHO said the first infected passenger likely contracted the virus before the cruise began, due to the disease’s one- to six-week incubation period. The ship had departed from Ushuaia on April 1, with the first death occurring on April 11.

Argentine officials said the first victims had visited Chile, Uruguay and Argentina before boarding the ship, and experts will test rodents in Ushuaia for hantavirus.

Low global risk

Health officials emphasised that the risk of a wider global outbreak remains low, noting the virus is far less contagious than Covid-19.

Two additional patients are still receiving treatment in Johannesburg and Zurich. Meanwhile, UK authorities advised two returning passengers to self-isolate as a precaution, despite showing no symptoms.

Spanish Health Minister Monica Garcia Gomez said all foreign passengers would be flown home from Tenerife if medically cleared.

Contact tracing efforts

Authorities are tracing passengers who may have been exposed during commercial flights. One Dutch victim had travelled from Saint Helena to Johannesburg while symptomatic, while Dutch airline KLM confirmed another infected passenger briefly boarded a flight from Johannesburg to the Netherlands before being removed prior to take-off.

The cruise ship originally carried 88 passengers and 59 crew members representing 23 nationalities.