Joselito Malig

Article (news)

Agence France-Presse

The WHO chief assured the people of Tenerife Saturday that the risk to them from an arriving cruise ship hit with a deadly hantavirus outbreak was &quot;low&quot;.&quot;I need you to hear me clearly: this is not another Covid,&quot; World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wrote in an open letter to the people of the Spanish island where the MV Hondius was expected to arrive Sunday.&quot;The current public health risk from hantavirus remains low.&quot;The Dutch-flagged cruise ship was expected to reach waters off Tenerife at dawn, with Tedros also due on the archipelago to help coordinate the evacuation of around 150 people on board.Three passengers from the ship -- a Dutch husband and wife and a German woman -- have died, while others have fallen sick with the rare disease, which usually spreads among rodents.The only hantavirus type that can transmit from person to person -- the Andes virus -- has been confirmed among those who have tested positive, fuelling international concern.It has also sparked fears among people of the Canary Islands, with regional authorities having refused to allow the vessel to dock, deciding it will remain offshore while passengers are screened and evacuated.In his open letter, Tedros said he had thanked Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez for Spain&#x27;s &quot;solidarity&quot; in agreeing to receive the ship.&quot;I know you are worried,&quot; Tedros wrote in his open letter.&quot;I know that when you hear the word &#x27;outbreak&#x27; and watch a ship sail toward your shores, memories surface that none of us have fully put to rest. The pain of 2020 is still real, and I do not dismiss it for a single moment,&quot; he said.Tedros acknowledged that the Andes strain of hantavirus &quot;is serious&quot;.&quot;Three people have lost their lives, and our hearts go out to their families,&quot; he said, stressing though that &quot;the risk to you, living your daily life in Tenerife, is low&quot;.&quot;This is the WHO&#x27;s assessment, and we do not make it lightly.&quot;An expert with the United Nations health agency was on board and had determined that currently &quot;there are no symptomatic passengers&quot;, Tedros said.He also highlighted that &quot;medical supplies are in place&quot; and stressed that Spanish authorities had prepared a &quot;careful, step-by-step plan&quot; for the evacuation.According to that plan, he said, &quot;passengers will be ferried ashore at the industrial port of Granadilla, far from residential areas, in sealed, guarded vehicles, through a completely cordoned-off corridor, and repatriated directly to their home countries&quot;.&quot;You will not encounter them. Your families will not encounter them.&quot;

The WHO chief assured the people of Tenerife Saturday that the risk to them from an arriving cruise ship hit with a deadly hantavirus outbreak was "low".

The WHO chief assured the people of Tenerife Saturday that the risk to them from an arriving cruise ship hit with a deadly hantavirus outbreak was "low".

WHO chief says hantavirus 'not another COVID' pandemic

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WHO chief says hantavirus 'not another COVID' pandemic

Agence France-Presse

Published May 09, 2026 09:09 PM PHT

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