90-Second Read: CDC head assures Americans Hantavirus outbreak isn’t the new COVID: ‘Shouldn’t be panicking’

Jay Bhattacharya urged the public not to panic over the Hantavirus outbreak on a cruise ship, underscoring that it's not like COVID-19. We want to treat it with our Hantavirus protocols that were successful at containing outbreaks in the past." "The key message I want to send to your audience is that this is not COVID. At least three passengers have died and five others were seriously ill with Hantavirus symptoms since April 11, according to World Health Organization officials. This is not going to lead to the [same] kind of outbreak," he added. We shouldn't be panicking when the evidence doesn't warrant it." Hantavirus, a disease commonly found in rodents, can cause nasty symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhea, fevers, lung issues, and more.

While Hantavirus can spread from person to person, it requires close contact and is widely seen as much less contagious than the COVID-19 respiratory illness, experts say. An outbreak took place on the MV Hondius cruise ship, which had about 150 people on board before it began disembarking over the weekend. It can take some six weeks before people start showing Hantavirus symptoms. Acting Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. I don't want to cause a public panic," Bhattacharya told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday.

Bhattacharya, who also helms the National Institutes of Health (NIH), defended the CDC's contact tracing methods revolving around the seven passengers who already flew back several weeks ago, and insisted the agency is following its protocols. A staggering 38% of those who get respiratory symptoms die, per the CDC. The acting CDC boss explained that passengers who flew on flights with those seven Americans are "considered contacts of contacts" and do not require a more rigorous check on how far the potential spread may have gone. Because the virus doesn't spread unless somebody has active symptoms, those passengers on the planes are considered contacts of contacts." "There's not a reason to do that kind of sort of recursive contact tracing," he added. The CDC has been in contact with each.

The ship anchored near Spain's Canary Islands, where passengers have begun disembarking. There are 17 American passengers aboard that ship, who may quarantine at a facility in Nebraska once they get back in the US. The seven American passengers who departed the ship last month after the first passenger died are spread out across Arizona, California, Georgia, Texas, and Virginia. The passengers on the ship that flew home were not symptomatic when they flew home.