To think the Hantavirus will spreadif

[Jollyjupiter]

If they allow the cruise ship to dock snd passangers travel all over the world.
Symptoms may not show for up to 8 weeks.

Hantaviruses already exist in Europe.

The risk of the strain on the ship spreading is minimal.

YABU.

I would think that if op was an epidemiologist, she wouldn't need to ask about the virus on MN.

Are you saying OP is not allowed to write on a chat forum about this subject unless she is an epidemiologist? Odd.

It's not an airborne virus.

It's contracted by ingesting the virus by eating or other direct contact from infected materials.

Human to human transmission is indirect.

You worry unnecessarily

But in response to the OP specifically, they are already contact tracing everyone that was on the ship or that flew with people from the ship. They are doing their due diligence. And while it is confirmed that it is the Andes strain that can transmit human-to-human, and have said that they believe that one person brought it aboard after visiting a landfill to birdwatch, it is not contagious enough to be worried about a large scale outbreak.

It won’t. 😂 There’s loads of hantavirus in the world. There’s good reason why it hasn’t become a big global pandemic. Because it doesn’t transmit person to person and you have to have quite close contact with the vector for transmission.

If that was my thought process, possibly it would be odd.

However the question is "AIBU to think that Hantavirus will spread if..."

OP is saying that she thinks it will spread. Before I can answer the question, I need to know whether or not she has expertise in the area?

If an epidemiologist thinks something she knows a lot about will spread, that is not an unreasonable assumption.

If someone who had never heard of Hantavirus until yesterday thinks it will spread, then their opinion is not informative.

I’m in a country that didn’t lock down. Our epidemiologist knew what he was doing.

UK fucked up completely, as your politicians make all the decisions instead of experts.

Quite possible, but then it does anyway, it's rare between humans, but does happen. There have been outbreaks before.

I'd not be surprised if the odd case occurs secondary to the ships passengers, but can't see it becoming a covid type thing.

Wait for it, there’ll be threads soon shouting for masks and lockdown.

When the word “uptick” is mentioned, we’ve all had it.

Sweden I'm guessing, Anders Tegnell, one of few cool heads in a crisis who called it right!

Still, if someone on an open chat forum is worried about a virus that is on the news all over the world, why not just explain nicely why she probably does not need to worry, rather than adk if she (or he) is an epidemiologist.

Yes, he was great. Our politicians backed right off.

But to be fair, noone knew what the outcome would be and lots of people sadly did die.

I think they need to exterminate the rodents in the ship. Hopefully ahead of docking. Clean it all well.

I do not think there will be an epidemic from the humans. They are going to be on quaratine anyway. But if the rodents dock too, then there could be a bit of an issue.
I hope those affected recover well.

The following is from an article in The Conversation:

https://theconversation.com/ive-investigated-a-hantavirus-outbreak-heres-what-i-can-tell-you-about-the-cruise-ship-cluster-282365

The practical public health response must ... cover both possibilities: a common environmental source and limited person-to-person spread.

That means detailed interviews about pre-boarding travel, shore excursions, wildlife exposure, rodent sightings, cabin locations, cleaning activities, shared dining, shared transport, and close contact with ill passengers.

It also means laboratory confirmation in multiple cases, sequencing of viral samples where possible, and careful reconstruction of who had contact with whom, and when.

Genetic fingerprinting can explore if the virus has the same historical mutation that allowed human-to-human transmission to emerge in previous outbreaks (which were easily controlled with basic isolation and infection control). If a new mutation was found, this would raise concerns of greater transmission risks.

For the public and health authorities considering receiving the passengers from the quarantined ship, the key message is not to panic.

Most hantaviruses are not spread between people. Even with Andes virus, person-to-person transmission is uncommon and usually requires close or prolonged contact. WHO currently assesses the risk to the global population as low. This virus does not spread like influenza or COVID.

But for outbreak investigators, this is exactly the sort of cluster that demands disciplined shoe-leather epidemiology: confirm the diagnosis, build the timeline, test the competing hypotheses, and let the pattern of exposure, illness and laboratory evidence tell the story.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion on science, and to educate themselves on scientific matters - some of the greatest scientific discoveries were made by non-scientists.

My degree is in Physics, that doesn't preclude someone who doesn't have a degree in physics being interested, having an opinion or actually being very knowledgeable.

A good example would be Sir Patrick Moore, who would be acknowledged as something o of an expert in the field of astronomy, but was by profession a French Teacher, and held no professional qualifications in physics or astronomy.

I said the person above. Not the OP. Someone about 4 posts above the one I quoted said

I am not saying we are going to have an epidemic. BUT the above is just not true. The previous outbreaks in Argentina involved a party and a hospital. Sounds familiar??

I heard on radio 4 that two guests went birdwatching on a rubbish tip

The UK government has info on this - presumably the information there about previous outbreaks is not made up:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/andes-hantavirus-epidemiology-outbreaks-and-guidance#transmission

And he did have some rather odd ideas which were at odds with mainstream astronomy and later proven incorrect.

Volcanoes on the moon being the first that springs to mind

And I'm not at all sure that everyone is entitled to an opinion on science. Or at least, not everyone's scientific opinion is worthy of the same attention.

Person with PhD in Astronomy believes that the sun is at the centre of the solar system. Fair

Person with degree in Philosophy believes that the world is carried on the back of a turtle. Less plausible.

No quite the opposite. I think people need to realise that there are outbreaks of all kinds of horrible viruses all over the world all the time. The fact no one was panicking (and it hasn’t even made the news) over an outbreak in Argentina over the past year should show people that a few cases on a cruise ship are not worth panicking over!

Thanks for clarifying! Apologies for misunderstanding your post.

Hopefully they can track all the passengers who disembarked in St Helena and those who were on the flights (I know it was only 1 flight but she got on the second and was removed) with the lady who died. Previous cases of andes variant of hantavirus have had an R number of 2.12. Where i wouldn't be concerned it is very important that those people are isolated. I'll link and article and the study I am talking about.

https://edition.cnn.com/2026/05/06/health/andes-strain-hantavirus-explained

www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2009040#ap1&uccLastUpdatedDate=2026-01-20%2016%3A06%3A29.751%20%2B0000&rememberMe=true

Yes 😟 It's supposedly most contagious during the early stage, when a fever appears alongside 'flu-like' symptoms and gastric upsets. This stage sometimes appears quickly, other times it can be four weeks or longer.

In the Argentinian case, a man with a fever attended a party for 90 minutes. He infected five people, two of them at the same table and two who were sitting roughly 4 feet away from him. The other victim only passed him briefly on the way to the toilets.

One of those infected six others before he died, 16 days after first showing symptoms. His wife, who attended his wake with a fever, infected 10 others, who all became sick between 17 and 40 days after attending that event. An additional 12 people were infected after contact with previously infected patients.

I'm not drawing too many conclusions - one can only hope that all the cruise passengers and crew genuinely do isolate themselves - but I'm nervous.

https://edition.cnn.com/2026/05/06/health/andes-strain-hantavirus-explained

Hantavirus can mutate and recombine very easily. Something to do with it having three different protein spikes.