90-Second Read: Hantavirus is not Covid-19, but ‘calm-mongering’ risks triggering post-Covid anxiety

Late Sunday, after the return of 18 passengers from the cruise ship MV Hondius to the United States, HHS announced that one person had tested "mildly PCR positive" for the Andes strain of Hantavirus. Even so, to some, it exemplified the communications problems around the Hantavirus outbreak. One point public health officials have repeatedly emphasized is that Hantavirus normally infects people who come into contact with urine or droppings from infected rats. Since the first sign of an outbreak, the reminders have come from government officials, health agencies and plenty of experts: There's no reason to worry. More cases are expected to be identified, but both the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization say the risk to the general public remains low.

Statements meant to quell anxiety instead risk undermining trust if they later turn out not to be true. Every reassuring message should have a verbal asterisk: 'We don't know as much about Hantaviruses as we wish we did,'" Sandman said in an email to CNN. In a detailed study of a 2018 outbreak of Andes virus in Argentina, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, there were documented cases in which people were infected after only brief interactions. Knowledge of the Andes virus is limited, but it has been studied in outbreak settings before. Berger cites this as an example of what he and others have called "calm-mongering." Dr.

Officials also point out that Covid was a brand-new virus, while this one is not. Clear, precise public health communication matters," said Dr. Health communicators would be wise to start every news conference by acknowledging that this feels like Covid redux, he said. Mention a few ways it echoes Covid and agree that people are wise to be a bit skeptical about official 'nothing to worry about' messaging. We have this under control, and we're not worried about it," US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F.

The incubation period for the flu is one to four days; for Covid, it's two to 14 days. It's really teaching the public to recognize that 'this is what we know now, and we all have to stay aware and be prepared that there might be a new update,'" Hong said. Still, some health experts say that at points, the messaging has been overly confident and too willing to dismiss the possibility of a threat. This almost certainly won't become the global health emergency that Covid was. But the echoes of Covid will be hard for health officials to escape.