Hantavirus spread sparks concern

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00]A haunt virus outbreak on board a cruise ship in the Atlantic. This new footage from NBC News shows the urgent evacuation this morning of people removed from the ship who are in need of medical care. The WHO says that there are eight cases of the virus stemming from the cluster on the cruise ship.

[00:00:17]Three people have died. So, what is the HANA virus and are medical professionals worried about it? Could it spread?

[00:00:22]Infectious disease specialist Dr. Virginia Banks, she is joining us now to explain what she knows about it. Thank you for taking the time, D.

[00:00:30]>> Oh, you're more than welcome. Happy to do it. Thank you for having me.

[00:00:33]>> Yes. So, Dr. Banks, can you tell us about the Honda virus? How is it typically spread anyway? What makes it different this time?

[00:00:40]>> Well, I can tell you that most recently, last year, I think people remember when Gan Hackman and his wife were found in their home and she died of hivirus. And it's endemic in the United States. It's not like we haven't heard of it, but typically it spread through rodent droppings, rodent uh salava and and droppings and so forth. And typically the story is somebody's been cleaning out a shed where there have been uh those um animals and there's been aerosolization and so forth and and then people develop hirus. But what's different with this is that we believe and again I you know everything right now is is we believe that instead of this being the typical rodent transmission that this is personto person which is a a lot more concerning.

[00:01:33]>> Yeah. And what are the common symptoms of the disease because a lot of folks are not sure where antivirus even comes from.

[00:01:40]>> Right. Well we've known about it. I I guess it sort of came to the United States our knowledge of it about 199394 and again mostly in the southwest but the pulmonary symptoms lung symptoms are mostly shortness of breath uh you can have GI symptoms of diarrhea fever malaise but the problem with it is that if you acquire which again I I mentioned the respiratory symptoms the mortality of it can be upwards of 38% and there is no antiviral there there were no vaccines for hivirus and so that's one of the reasons why it's been very important for um them to get these people evacuated off this ship because you have to get them to an intensive care unit environment for supportive care >> and the WHO says they're doing the contact tracing too just to make sure no one else got into contact with those individuals no one else is still sick >> yes that's that's true at least case one and case two appear to be a couple who had close contact with each other and at least from what We know it's not like influenza or co but you know Lindsay I always say we need to have a very healthy respect for viruses uh these days. Um again I you know this virus typically was not efficient really except for the Andes strain which is what they believe that this is now not an efficient virus to grab on to the lungs but with global warming and changes in environment we don't know. So I think we need to have a very healthy respect for these. I certainly am. You know, unfortunately, we're not a member of World Health Organization right now.

[00:03:15]So I'm trying to do as much as I can and stay vigilant so that I can continue to be a trusted messenger here. And remember, I believe that there are two Americans on that ship as well.

[00:03:26]>> Yeah. A lot of folks wondering, is this the next CO? Could it spread here? What are your thoughts on that? Well, it from at least from the the way that it spreads it the it's a long incubation.

[00:03:37]It's not like CO or influenza. The incubation can be anywhere from 2 to four weeks, but sometimes it could be a week or less. So, you know, that's why they're studying it. They're they don't know where these people got it. The cruise started in Argentina, which is where that Andes strain usually comes from. Um, and three people have already died. So, I'm going to stay vigilant.

[00:03:59]you know, they're having they're finding problems docking the ship for obvious reasons with a a virus that could potentially be airborne. So, you know, it's a it's an evolving story, if you will.

[00:04:11]>> All right, Dr. D. Banks, thank you so much for taking time to join us here at 5. Thank you for having