90-Second Read: Baseless Hantavirus 'scamdemic' claims cite unrelated Australia lab incident

The global scare prompted by a deadly Hantavirus outbreak aboard an Atlantic cruise ship has revived Covid-era falsehoods, including posts baselessly linking the rare outbreak to 2024 reports of an Au... Similar claims rocketed in Canada -- and in languages such as Dutch -- with some suggesting the Australian laboratory incident proves the recent Hantavirus outbreak was an " engineered release ". According to the WHO, a total of 10 Hantavirus cases have been reported in the cruise ship outbreak, including three deaths as of May 15 ( archived link ). Covid-style misinformation resurged when three passengers of the MV Hondius, travelling from Argentina to Cape Verde, died from Hantavirus -- for which no vaccines nor specific treatments currently exist ( archived link ).

A spokesperson with Queensland Health told AFP in a May 18, 2026 email: "There is no evidence of any link between the MV Hondius Hantavirus outbreak and the unaccounted virus samples from Queensland's virology laboratory". All known cases in the current outbreak were people on board the ship, with the global health agency saying the risk to the general population is " absolutely low " ( archived link ). So-called "old world" Hantaviruses were discovered much earlier, when an outbreak sickened more than 3,000 United Nations troops fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War ( archived link ). Laboratory-confirmed infections on the Dutch-flagged vessel point to the Andes virus, a strain endemic in parts of South America and already circulating for decades.

It links to a December 2024 Newsweek report that hundreds of vials containing live viruses -- including Hantavirus -- have gone missing from a laboratory in Queensland ( archived link ). Moreover, an investigation into the laboratory incident commissioned by Queensland Health said the breach was related to materials discarded from a failed laboratory freezer ( archived link ). At the time the incident was reported, Queensland's chief health officer John Gerrard had said the virus samples "would degrade very rapidly outside a low temperature freezer and become non-infectious" ( archived link ). Andes virus infection in humans was first described in Argentina in 1995 and in Chile later the same year -- predating the Australian laboratory breach by decades (archived here and here ).

A pair of studies published in the peer-reviewed Science journal points to the natural origin of the coronavirus, previously unknown until its detection in late 2019 ( archived link ). The same details were found in the full Newsweek report shared in the false posts. People usually get infected through contact with infected rodents or their urine, droppings or saliva.