Hantavirus: - Current Situation and Concerns.

[TLS Guy]

I am sure you have been following this Hantavirus outbreak in a cruise ship, likely infected from the Andes range of Argentina.

Few physicians world wide have ever encountered a case. I happen to have encountered two, and the first confirmed long after the patient's death.

This virus was first named after a serious of pneumonia cases with a high death rate in the Four Corners States back in 1998. The virus was identified at that time and named Hantavirus.

I had a bad case of pneumonia leading to severe ARDS and renal failure in a 19 year old Indian male from the Devil's Lake Indian reservation in ND.

The patient unfortunately died, but I never identified the cause. So I had the coroner order a PM. The PM shed no light on the matter. So I had the pathologist take some serum and have it frozen on perpetuity in the lab freezer. When the Four Corners outbreak occurred and we had a serological test for the Hantavirus, I had the specimen thawed out and tested for Hantavirus. So that young man had died of Hantavirus.

A few years after Hantavirus was identified we had a new recruit on our team who had a young woman with a severe pneumonia that she did not know the cause of. This case also from Devil's Lake. I thought the case had a lot of similarities to my previous case and ordered Hantavirus serology, which was positive. After a massive prolonged fight we saved the young woman's life.

Now the virus was believed to be only transmitted from Rodents, which I think previously it was.

Now this Andes strain of the virus is transmissible human to human, and there is now no doubt about that, but the degree of its infectivity is currently unknown.

This is a serious and very worrying situation as this illness is far, far more serious and lethal than Covid. Mortality per case is at least 40%, with almost all cases needing ventilator support and a lot dialysis as well.

Currently there are 3 deaths of passengers from the stricken ship, and 8 individuals from ship seriously ill, including the ship's physician.

There are currently 68 contacts world wide under close observation.

The concerns are that this virus is clearly mutating and becoming increasingly transmissible. So at this time this is a very serious evolving infectious disease situation.

Clearly a vaccine for this infection needs to be developed at warp speed, and yet we have a vaccine denier in JFK Junior who is secretary of Health. Congress must act now to sort this out.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

Congress must act now to sort this out.

Hahahahahaha, You're serious??? Can't be... OMG. I'm laughing my behind off. This congress is worse than a joke. They will do absolutely nothing about this, and for that matter, anything else at all. And after Trump gets reelected the 3rd time, he'll just straight out dismiss all of them. Mark my words.

Just to be clear, your concern about the virus and vaccinations are 100% valid. My point is, we are 100% #ucked unless somehow we get lucky and virus victims die out before spreading it.

 

[Alex2507]

I turn my back for 5 minutes and come back to this ?!?

If I had a buzz you guys would definitely be wrecking it.

RFK Junior

FTFY. What happened to him getting canned? Wasn't that a thing?

 

[mtrycrafts]

RFK? MIA. Still trying to make bleach a viable thing for these with blue light.

What an Ahole that guy is. Maybe he is trying to be a Bhole?

 

[mtrycrafts]

Let's hope this doesn't mutate to be transmitted between humans although it is starting to look like it.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

RFK? MIA.

I wish, but alas the c-hole is quite active:

FDA vaccine studies censored by Trump admin after finding benefits of shots

FDA has suppressed studies on COVID-19 vaccines and Shingrix, a shingles vaccine.

arstechnica.com

RFK Jr. plans to curb antidepressants, which he falsely compares to heroin

Kennedy has made—and continues to make—many false claims about SSRIs.

arstechnica.com

RFK Jr. appeals ruling that wiped out his vaccine advisory panel

There was uncertainty about whether Kennedy would fight or simply try an end run.

arstechnica.com

 

[TLS Guy]

Let's hope this doesn't mutate to be transmitted between humans although it is starting to look like it.

It is, that is confirmed now.

But I should be clear, we are not sure how close contact has to be. The general behavior of viruses is to forgo some virulence for increased infectivity, as obviously that has an evolutionary advantage. However, this virus needs to loose an awful lot of virulence to not be a severe threat.

I had not realized that Argentina had noted human to human transmission, but it seems they kept quiet about it, which was unethical. I assumed the ship was full of rats, as a lot are. That does not seem to be the case. There seems no doubt that this outbreak originated from the Andes and the first case arose in the ship after a passenger made a trip to the Andes while the ship was in port. As you know this is an evolving story.

 

[TLS Guy]

Now what I have been afraid of is unfolding. 28 passengers from the ship left at St. Helena. They took flights from there. One of those passengers has become ill with the virus, and now an air hostess on the flight has become sick and is under observation.

This could easily evolve into a very serious problem if not quickly contained. If confirmed this means tertiary spread, which will not be a good omen.

What makes this worse is that the incubation period can be as long as 8 weeks, but more typically 2 to 3.

 

[mtrycrafts]

I wish, but alas the c-hole is quite active:

FDA vaccine studies censored by Trump admin after finding benefits of shots

FDA has suppressed studies on COVID-19 vaccines and Shingrix, a shingles vaccine.

arstechnica.com

RFK Jr. plans to curb antidepressants, which he falsely compares to heroin

Kennedy has made—and continues to make—many false claims about SSRIs.

arstechnica.com

RFK Jr. appeals ruling that wiped out his vaccine advisory panel

There was uncertainty about whether Kennedy would fight or simply try an end run.

arstechnica.com

Thanks. I really meant he is MIA on this Hantavirus.

 

[Mikado463]

Agreed, the current admin and our dysfunctional Congress do not bode well for pro-active involvement

 

[shadyJ]

Clearly a vaccine for this infection needs to be developed at warp speed, and yet we have a vaccine denier in JFK Junior who is secretary of Health. Congress must act now to sort this out.

Lol, we're so dead.

 

[shadyJ]

Mega-LOLs from April 2025: CDC's cruise ship inspectors laid off amid bad year for outbreaks

 

[mtrycrafts]

Warp speed? We need the "spore" drive?

 

[Verdinut]

The WHO explains why there are no reasons for worry in North America, as this hantavirus is not that easy to transmit. It's not a retrovirus.

Hantavirus

WHO fact sheet on hantaviruses provides key facts and information on transmission, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, prevention and control, and public health response.

www.who.int

Hantavirus cluster linked to cruise ship travel, Multi-country

On 2 May 2026, a cluster of passengers with severe respiratory illness aboard a cruise ship was reported to the World Health Organization. The ship is carrying 147 passengers and crew. As of 4 May 2026, seven cases (two laboratory confirmed cases of hantavirus and five suspected cases) have been...

www.who.int

 

[highfigh]

I am sure you have been following this Hantavirus outbreak in a cruise ship, likely infected from the Andes range of Argentina.

Few physicians world wide have ever encountered a case. I happen to have encountered two, and the first confirmed long after the patient's death.

This virus was first named after a serious of pneumonia cases with a high death rate in the Four Corners States back in 1998. The virus was identified at that time and named Hantavirus.

I had a bad case of pneumonia leading to severe ARDS and renal failure in a 19 year old Indian male from the Devil's Lake Indian reservation in ND.

The patient unfortunately died, but I never identified the cause. So I had the coroner order a PM. The PM shed no light on the matter. So I had the pathologist take some serum and have it frozen on perpetuity in the lab freezer. When the Four Corners outbreak occurred and we had a serological test for the Hantavirus, I had the specimen thawed out and tested for Hantavirus. So that young man had died of Hantavirus.

A few years after Hantavirus was identified we had a new recruit on our team who had a young woman with a severe pneumonia that she did not know the cause of. This case also from Devil's Lake. I thought the case had a lot of similarities to my previous case and ordered Hantavirus serology, which was positive. After a massive prolonged fight we saved the young woman's life.

Now the virus was believed to be only transmitted from Rodents, which I think previously it was.

Now this Andes strain of the virus is transmissible human to human, and there is now no doubt about that, but the degree of its infectivity is currently unknown.

This is a serious and very worrying situation as this illness is far, far more serious and lethal than Covid. Mortality per case is at least 40%, with almost all cases needing ventilator support and a lot dialysis as well.

Currently there are 3 deaths of passengers from the stricken ship, and 8 individuals from ship seriously ill, including the ship's physician.

There are currently 68 contacts world wide under close observation.

The concerns are that this virus is clearly mutating and becoming increasingly transmissible. So at this time this is a very serious evolving infectious disease situation.

Clearly a vaccine for this infection needs to be developed at warp speed, and yet we have a vaccine denier in JFK Junior who is secretary of Health. Congress must act now to sort this out.

" Few physicians world wide have ever encountered a case", where? CDC link shows that 890 cases have been seen in the US- most people in the SW United States know that it's a problem.

Not sure how the US congress should be responsible for a disease coming from South America when improper pest control and cleaning are to blame.

https://www.cdc.gov/hantavirus/data-research/cases/index.html

 

[TLS Guy]

The WHO explains why there are no reasons for worry in North America, as this hantavirus is not that easy to transmit. It's not a retrovirus.

Hantavirus

WHO fact sheet on hantaviruses provides key facts and information on transmission, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, prevention and control, and public health response.

www.who.int

Hantavirus cluster linked to cruise ship travel, Multi-country

On 2 May 2026, a cluster of passengers with severe respiratory illness aboard a cruise ship was reported to the World Health Organization. The ship is carrying 147 passengers and crew. As of 4 May 2026, seven cases (two laboratory confirmed cases of hantavirus and five suspected cases) have been...

www.who.int

I hope that is still true, but that is not a certainty. I was stunned that there is now proof of person to person spread. Previously it was only rodent to people. So clearly the virus is mutating. So, vigilance and close observation is required. At this time it would seem person to person infectivity is not high, but it is anyone's guess how the virus may evolve. So, extreme vigilance is required and great efforts must be made to prevent person to person spread in the infections that we know about. I worry about the ones we don't know about.

As far as I can tell, I am the only person who diagnosed a deceased case long after the patients death. That is due to Dr. Merriweather, who was the physician who was the infection control specialist at Guys Hospital. He was a great character, and the first to test sewage systems to trace infections disease. He did this during a nasty London typhoid epidemic believed to be due to an asymptomatic carrier. So he drilled down the infection and traced it to a baker's shop. I remember him clearly saying: - "I lined those bakers up and said pass feces!" He found his carrier and ended the epidemic. Anyhow he advised us that if we ever came across an infectious disease case in which the cause could not be identified to save and freeze some of the patient's serum. I remembered his advice and identified the cause of death some years after my patient died. So Hantavirus had been around prior to the Four Corners outbreak in 1998 when the virus was first identified.

 

[jinjuku]

. My point is, we are 100% #ucked unless somehow we get lucky and virus victims die out before spreading it.

Or certain officials of the administration get infected.

 

[jinjuku]

Now what I have been afraid of is unfolding. 28 passengers from the ship left at St. Helena. They took flights from there. One of those passengers has become ill with the virus, and now an air hostess on the flight has become sick and is under observation.

This could easily evolve into a very serious problem if not quickly contained. If confirmed this means tertiary spread, which will not be a good omen.

What makes this worse is that the incubation period can be as long as 8 weeks, but more typically 2 to 3.

Are there any game models out there for the rate and spread given these data points?

 

[TLS Guy]

Are there any game models out there for the rate and spread given these data points?

Yes, there are, but nature usually confounds them. You can only model for what you know and it is the unknowns that get you and bite you hard.

 

[pewternhrata]

Let's hope this doesn't mutate to be transmitted between humans although it is starting to look like it.

Go buy into media hype, reckless to spew those ideas, just another conspiracy for no reason. To be honest I thought we all were doa with covid.