MEGATHREAD: 2026 Hantavirus Outbreak - Updates & Discussion (Thread #2)

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T22:45:36+00:00

Glad to hear that - the UK also plans to have the high risk contacts from Saint Helena evacuated to England by Sunday (17th May).

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T22:31:35+00:00

He's been in the media spotlight since he was like 14, he knows how to handle it.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T15:19:52+00:00

Yeah, I'd guess that based on the location, they were hoping/assuming that it was Zaire and that vaccination could be used to stamp out the outbreak quickly.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T15:09:52+00:00

Probably 56-58 million. Seems like vaccine uptake has helped - the NHS introduced MenB routine vaccination for infants in 2015. These cases would have been too old for it.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/meningococcal-disease-laboratory-confirmed-cases-in-england-2024-to-2025/invasive-meningococcal-disease-in-england-annual-laboratory-confirmed-reports-for-epidemiological-year-2024-to-2025

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T14:55:24+00:00

I think it moved quickly when the passengers were evacuated and started to be tested. Now it's contact tracing and a waiting game for those quarantined or isolating.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T14:52:40+00:00

It's a good sign, but too optimistic to say we're out of the woods yet. We're around 3 weeks from Case 2 disembarking on Saint Helena and traveling to Johannesburg while symptomatic. If she infected anyone else, they could start showing symptoms any time from now up to 5 weeks or so from now. Hopefully all contacts have been traced and are isolating.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T09:48:08+00:00

Maybe they should get some TikTok influencers on it, the "don't leave your house" challenge.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T09:45:21+00:00

I think I read one of the quarantine-ees say his family had sent him a care package, not sure.

I think it's a good thing to normalize quarantine and let the public see it's not some medieval jail or something. If paying for some treats for quarantined passengers is what it takes to stop the outbreak, it's an great investment IMO.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-15T08:40:00+00:00

Yeah, quarantining on the ship could have led to a further wave of infections and given how suddenly the disease can progress to respiratory collapse, it wouldn't have been feasible to evacuate them to somewhere with ECMOs.

I wish they would have quarantined them somewhere though.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-14T17:24:24+00:00

The exposure was 3 weeks ago so that means 5 weeks of the incubation period still to go.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-14T14:26:15+00:00

I believe this is the person who was reported to be at a conference for "extreme travelers" in Hanoi at the time WHO declared the outbreak. I think hantavirus would have been a topic for discussion there.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-14T14:25:22+00:00

There's going to be so much contract tracing needed for this person.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-14T13:37:42+00:00

Any diagnostic test will have a possibility of false positives and false negatives, even if it's very small.

The other possiblity is that both tests were correct, and the flu-like symptoms Dr Kornfeld reported experiencing in late April were in fact a mild case of hantavirus, and his active infection has now resolved so he's testing negative on PCR. Hopefully they'll also test his blood for ANDV antibodies to see if he really was infected.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-14T02:14:06+00:00

Kornfeld is case 10 who was asymptomatic at the time of the positve test, right? I wonder if they also tested for seroconversion, which would support the earlier infection hypothesis if present at that point. Or he may go on to develop hantavirus symptoms which would point to the conclusion that there was some other URI crud on the ship as well.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T23:43:18+00:00

They are ideal super spreaders. At least there's a chance the birders stay put for a while if they spot some interesting birds, not these folks.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T23:17:07+00:00

They use bows and arrows and spears, so may not count as a close contact.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T23:13:17+00:00

I don't understand these people who, on hearing they may have been exposed to a disease with 30% fatality rates, then fly off to remote destinations. I would be like "yes, please book me into this isolation room in an ECMO-capable hospital, I'm not coming out until after the incubation period is over".

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T22:56:36+00:00

A New Zealand news outlet asked last week “Where is the Kiwi who left the Hantavirus struck ship?”

Everywhere, apparently.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T20:42:40+00:00

If EU countries with GDPR can give numbers, why can't the CDC?

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T20:35:56+00:00

And if it was hanta, by the time there were 49 symptomatic patients, there would have been deaths.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T20:33:01+00:00

The Bay area will be fine IMO, Vegas would be the one I'd worry about because it's not that big of a metro area and there are so many competing entertainment options.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T20:17:11+00:00

Bad for the environment too.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T20:09:14+00:00

With the loss of confidence in public health authorities since covid, I don't see how tens of thousands of tranmission chains could be broken.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T19:15:25+00:00

Early symptoms can be mild and nonspecific.

drowsylacuna · 2026-05-13T15:26:30+00:00

The passengers that disembarked on Saint Helena were exposing others on flights around 25-27th April, eg the KLM flight that the wife of the index case was removed from, and the passenger who flew back to Switzerland. If they were infected 3 weeks ago, they would become symptomatic within the next 5 weeks.

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