(Image source from: Nurse.org)
The current hantavirus outbreak is causing global health worries. Many people are asking if it will spread like Covid-19. Will there be restrictions? Do people have to wear masks? At a press briefing on Thursday evening, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, who oversees Epidemic and Pandemic Management, explained, "This is not covid or the flu; it spreads in a very different way." "Right now, we don’t have any passengers or crew showing symptoms. In earlier Andes virus outbreaks, transmission mostly happened among people who were in close contact," she continued. Dr. Abdirahman Mahamud, who leads the Alert and Response Coordination Department in the WHO's Emergencies Health Programme, stated, "We saw something like this in Argentina from 2018 to 2019, where one symptomatic person at a social event led to many infections. We are facing a similar situation now, with a group in a small area and close connections. " "By following health measures such as tracing contacts and isolating, we can disrupt this spread. It does not need to become a big outbreak. It has occurred in a specific area where people are having prolonged close interactions," Dr. Mahamud added.
"It resembles the outbreak in Argentina, and we do not expect a large epidemic. Through health measures, we can stop the spread, leading to a limited outbreak," stated Dr. Mahamud.
Dr. Van Kerkhove also emphasized, "This is not coronavirus. This is a different virus that has been around for a while. We are not witnessing the start of a Covid pandemic; we are monitoring an outbreak on the ship happening in a small area. " "This is not like what we encountered six years ago. Its transmission is not the same," she added. The key difference between hantavirus and Covid-19 is that hantavirus mainly comes from animals, spreading from rodents to humans, while Covid-19 is very contagious and spreads between people. Although both can lead to serious breathing problems, hantavirus can be much more deadly in individual cases but is much less likely to cause a pandemic due to its inefficient human spread. Covid-19 can quickly become a pandemic, spreading through the air and infecting many people in one room. In contrast, hantavirus can only spread among humans through very close, extended contact. Hantavirus outbreaks tend to be localized.
Hantavirus mainly spreads when someone comes into contact with infected rodent urine, droppings, or saliva. Human-to-human transmission is very rare. Although a recent outbreak on a cruise ship involved the Andes strain, the only type known to spread between humans, transmission still demands very close, intimate contact. During the media briefing, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO Director-General, remarked, "Considering the incubation period of the Andes virus, which can be as long as six weeks, we may see more cases reported. While this is a serious situation, the WHO considers the public health threat to be low."
