A U.S. and a French national who have returned recently to their home countries have left a cruise ship hit by the deadly outbreak of Hantavirus have tested positive, a report says.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services published a press release on May 10, 2026, stating that a second American national on the repatriation flight had also shown mild symptoms, adding that both passengers had traveled back in “biocontainment units out of an abundance of caution.”
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the outbreak is caused by a multinational Hantavirus cluster linked to the cruise ship MV Hondius. More than 90 passengers aboard the ship are not docking at the Spanish Canary Islands as a precautionary measure. Virologists around the world have stepped up their research to find quick solutions to this virus. Although human-to-human transmission is rare in this case, they don’t want to take any risk. Already, more than 10 people have lost their lives due to this outbreak.
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According to a fellow at the World Health Organization (WHO), hantaviruses are mostly carried by rodents, but the Andes strain, which the WHO believes was transmitted by some of the Dutch ship’s passengers while in South America.
In its statement early on Monday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said that all 17 U.S. citizens on the flight “will undergo clinical assessment.”
The MV Hondius departed Argentina’s southern city of Ushuaia on 1 April and is currently docked at the port of Grandilla, southern Tenerife.
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