Anyone else worried about Andes virus transmission after the cruise ship cases?

[BabyWally]

Hantavirus is on a cruise ship. Where you get that from rodent droppings. There's a subnet of that virus and it's called Andesvirus and apparently that is human to human transmission.

Anyone else worried about the possibilty of that virus getting out of hand and the possibilty of a Panasonic this year?

There's no wat that virus is contained on the ship any more because one of the people who died travelled on a plane while ill and died in an airport.

That virus is travelling the world in many people right now but we won't know the extent of it yet because the incubation period can be so long 1-8 weeks apparently to show symptoms.

My issue is that I learned from covid that nobody cares when they are ill and showing symptoms of illness or sickness, it doesn't have to be covid, it's everything, it could be norovirus and people just pass it on as a fact of life and a badge of honour.

Many people are just not able to reflect when they are ill and just minimising passing on whatever they have.

There's the world cup in the summer time too and that will bring many people together.

Does anyone know if people are infectious with Andesvirus during incubation and before symptoms appear? Because if that's the case, we are f*cked.

As an immunocompromised person, I understand your fears about pandemics. Unfortunately we keep destroying nature so we will have more and more pandemics in the future. I've sort of just accepted that I'm the sacrifice society is willing to make so they don't have to change their habits.

The only thing you can really do is try not to focus on the news. Since 2020 the media have learned that any virus outbreak is huge news. They have always happened and always will.

All you can do is eat well, exercise, have your vaccines, and maintain good hygiene. I think you just have to focus on only the things you personally have control over.

No, people won't behave perfectly but enough people will comply and the R0 is small enough for Hantavirus that the effective reproduction number be reduced to less than 1. That's why I said stuttering chains of transmission.

Also, to the PP who mentioned Mpox, there are new cases in the UK every month but there is also a vaccine available for at risk individuals

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/monkeypox-outbreak-epidemiological-overview/mpox-outbreak-epidemiological-overview-9-april-2026

They contained and vaccinated against monkey pox if I remember correctly. That's why it never got out of control.

Rather like the millennium bug. It didn't happen because tens of thousands of IT and admin teams worked incredibly hard and fixed all the data glitches in time.

I would say very very mildly concerned. 1 on a scale of 1 to 10.

I keep getting flashbacks to Covid, but hopefully they learned from their mistakes and will be a lot more vigilant this time!

I'm not concerned. I agree if we get a pandemic we're stuffed because people cant seem to wash their hands or sneeze into tissues, but it'll be a flu that takes us out, not hantavirus.

Nobody will listen though because it's a badge of honour to pass around sickness

Is it?

Yep, what on earth is a 'badge of honour to pass around sickness?'

I think it’s different enough in terms of spread, ie the asymptomatic element mentioned below.

I think people have easily forgotten how to wash their hands and to cover a cough/sneeze but I also think that many people are traumatised by what happened during Covid so are more alert to the next similar virus which is causing fear and selling papers.

I’m not worried at the moment but know lots of people who are likely to become anxious when reading this.

Why would you worry about a known, rare virus that is contained on a ship effectively in the middle ofthe ocean, it’s hardly rampaging through the population, sad for those who have died and are ill and those stuck on board, but it’s hardly worth losing sleep over

No

I definitely think there is more reporting of viruses now. Maybe it’s my poor memory, but I was just reading an article on the BBC about this outbreak, and it said that in 2018 one person at a party spread hantavirus to 34 other people, and 11 died.
Maybe because it’s on a cruise ship that people are now stranded on it makes for a better story, but I don’t remember reading anything about these 2018 cases at all.

I don't think anyone has ever wandered around, not caring that they have norovirus. They will be on a toilet, pooing and crying.

No, they will be in the office the day after, playing hero while infectious

I had a boss who would take pride in coming in no matter how ill he was. Once he came in an hour late, looking absolutely shocking, saying he was late because he had to keep pulling the car over to throw up.

Dickhead.

Nope. Not worried at all. Not a virus with easy human to human transmission.

I understand your worries.
People are idiots which means that a disease which could be contained by regime and compliance is more likely to make a big breakout.

I do agree with PP thought, that even with the latest news about human transmissions, the most probable candidate is still flu, AFAIK there is some kind of bird flu which is one or two mutations away from being the next big thing, and now the US stopped the preventative vaccine development....

Another with a biology degree and also not too worried!

And touch wood, it is quite rare to get a highly contagious virus that also has a high mortality rate. Viruses that like to spread easily (if they had an innate ability to ponder these things!) aren't generally ones that kill their host because a dead host is a pretty useless vector...

The only thing this story has done is reaffirm my lack of desire to ever go on a cruise!

People catch it on buses and trains now and then, especially the metro. If you are worried, then wear a FFP3 mask whenever you are around a lot of people or taking public transport.

Yep, and meningitis! I can't believe how much scaremongering even the BBC did on that by having it run as a 'live' story for days on end.

I was very close to the outbreak and the amount of panic was ridiculous.

Not even a little bit warm under the collar here. It’s a non event (although, of course horrible for the families of the deceased).

IMO cruises are rank. Before COVID it was norovirus. They’re literally a self contained vessel that is the perfect environment for nasty bugs. You’ll never see me on one.

Stop watching the news or reading about it if it worries you, it’s clickbait. Look at the meningitis outbreak a few weeks ago, talk of lockdowns and vaccines then it’s never been mentioned again. A population in fear is easier to control! Worrying about it won’t change the outcome so ignore it and enhjoy your day!

It's because the news we see reports disproportionately on things that are affecting us or nearby nations. So when there is an outbreak in Argentina or the DRC or Bangladesh we don't get reporting here because it isn't seen to affect us. But now it's hit a ship of weathy Europeans it's a different matter.

The WHO reports on disease outbreaks - https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news

There was a Marburg outbreak in Ethiopia in November 2025. An Ebola outbreak in the DRC starting September 2025. There's cases of MERS (a coronavirus with a case fatality rate over 30%) in the Middle East every year. I don't remember anyone on here getting their knickers in a twist about those causing the next pandemic.

There will be other small spillover virus outbreaks happening right now, mostly in Africa and Asia, that will never be known about because they sicken or kill a small number of poor people and then burn out.

I’m concerned that nobody seems to have learnt anything from the last pandemic!
Putting a sick man on a full plane & then pulling him off again to die!
A grown man crying because he’s being quarantined on a luxury cruise ship!
I mean wouldn’t everyone rather be safe than sorry?

It's unusual to get so much human to human transmission – people normally catch it from contaminated surfaces or aerosols.

It looks like Cases 1 and 2 (a couple) got it by going bird watching on a landfill site (eww!) in Argentina, then took it onboard, where it has then spread to several other people (surely it would be too much of a coincidence for the ship's rats also to be carriers??)

Case 2 disembarked on St Helena and flew to ZA where she died. Fellow air passengers are being traced, amongst whom there's at least one suspected case (?) (French?).

More than twenty other passengers disembarked on St Helena for onward flights. One, in Zurich, is another suspected case.

The rest of the cases are still on the ship or have been evacuated as patients so presumably not an onward transmission risk.

Case fatality rate for this type of the virus is 40-50%.

I'm not too concerned because of the lack of asymptomatic transmission. Contact tracing ongoing, no doubt.