90-Second Read: 'This is not another COVID': WHO seeks to reassure Spanish island as Hantavirus-stricken ship approaches

The head of the World Health Organization is seeking to reassure residents of the Spanish island of Tenerife worried about the anticipated arrival there of a Hantavirus-stricken cruise ship. The current public health risk from Hantavirus remains low. Three people have died since the outbreak, and five passengers who left the ship are infected with Hantavirus. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, along with Spain's Health Minister Monica Garcia and Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska, were due on the island Saturday to coordinate the disembarkation of passengers and some members of the crew. But the Andes virus detected in the cruise ship outbreak may be able to spread between people in rare cases.

Meanwhile onboard the cruise ship, some Spanish passengers have voiced concern about being stigmatized. It wasn't until May 2 that health authorities first confirmed Hantavirus in a passenger. Dutch public health authorities have been monitoring people who were on a flight that was briefly boarded by a Dutch ship passenger who later died and was confirmed to have Hantavirus. I know that when you hear the word 'outbreak' and watch a ship sail toward your shores, memories surface that none of us have fully put to rest. Why did they have to bring a boat from another country here?

The pain of 2020 is still real, and I do not dismiss it for a single moment," Tedros said in a message to the people of Tenerife, alluding to the COVID-19 emergency that arrived abruptly that year. But I need you to hear me clearly: This is not another COVID. The WHO, Spanish authorities and cruise company Oceanwide Expeditions said nobody on the Hondius is currently showing symptoms of the virus. Three people who were on the flight and had symptoms have all tested negative for the virus, Dutch National Institute for Public Health spokesperson Harald Wychgel told the Associated Press on Saturday. Symptoms usually show between one and eight weeks after exposure.

Why not anywhere else; why bring it to the Canary Islands?" Others said they empathized with the boat's passengers but were still concerned. Oceanwide Expeditions has listed 13 Spanish passengers and one Spanish crew member on board. All Spanish passengers will be transferred to a medical facility and quarantined, Garcia said. Those without symptoms will go into home quarantine for six weeks and be monitored by local health services. On April 24, nearly two weeks after the first passenger died on board, more than two dozen people from at least 12 countries left the ship without contact tracing, Dutch officials and the ship's operator have said.