California Officials Identify Fifth Possible Andes Hantavirus Exposure Linked to MV Hondius

California public health officials said on Wednesday they identified a fifth resident of the state who may have been exposed to the Andes hantavirus due to the MV Hondius cruise ship, while stressing that none of the five California residents, nor any residents of the United States, currently has a confirmed case.

The California Department of Public Health said the newest possible exposure was learned from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and it said the individual remains asymptomatic and is currently in the Pitcairn Islands, a British territory in the South Pacific, where the person is being monitored by CDC and British health officials.

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The CDPH said the individual from Sacramento County was the only one among the five not aboard the MV Hondius, and that the person may have been exposed while aboard an international flight carrying a passenger who later died from the virus.

CBS News reported that exposed individuals are monitored for 42 days under CDC guidance, including daily temperature checks, symptom screenings and activity modifications, and it said hantaviruses typically spread through contact with infected rodent urine, droppings or saliva.

CBS News also said the Andes strain at the center of the MV Hondius outbreak is found mainly in parts of Argentina and Chile, and it noted that the Andes hantavirus differs from the Sin Nombre hantavirus strain found in parts of North America, which does not transmit from person to person.

A woman is isolating on the Pitcairn Islands after travelling on a hantavirus-hit cruise ship, and a local government spokesperson told the BBC she "had contact with a hantavirus-exposed individual" but was "showing no signs of illness."

The BBC said the woman flew from San Francisco on 7 May and travelled through Tahiti and then Mangareva in French Polynesia, and it reported that the UK foreign office was coordinating with the local authorities and the UK Health Security Agency "to manage the risks to the individual and the islanders."

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The BBC reported that UKHSA said the length of isolation for close contacts of cases is 45 days, and it said the Pitcairn government spokesman told the BBC, "The wellbeing of our community remains the top priority."

The BBC also said the French Polynesian government decided not to allow the woman to re-enter French Polynesia, adding that "she) will not leave Pitcairn Island to travel through French Polynesia as long as she poses a risk to others," even though French Polynesia said she is completely asymptomatic.

In the same BBC account, the MV Hondius was described as carrying 147 passengers and crew from 23 countries after departing from Ushuaia, southern Argentina, on 1 April, and the ship was expected to arrive in Rotterdam on 17 May.

Reason Magazine described how doctors reached Tristan da Cunha, a British overseas territory with a population of 224 and no airport, by parachuting in after a British Army airdrop of a medical team on Saturday in response to a hantavirus case on the island.

Reason Magazine said the plane loaded up with medical supplies, a doctor, a nurse, and a platoon of paratroopers from the 16 Air Assault Brigade at Royal Air Force Brize Norton, then refueled at Ascension Island before flying 2,000 miles south and dropping them on Tristan da Cunha.

The same Reason account linked the Tristan da Cunha case to the MV Hondius outbreak by saying the Tristanian victim had taken a trip on the MV Hondius, and it said Pitcairn Island has a population of 35 and is accessible by a 32-hour boat cruise from Mangareva.

Clinical Trials Arena reported that as of 11 May the number of cases tied to the MV Hondius outbreak had increased to ten cases, including three deaths, and it said seven were confirmed to be hantavirus with the remaining suspected.

Clinical Trials Arena also said the WHO had been notified on 2 May 2026 of an outbreak of severe acute respiratory illnesses on the Dutch-flagged cruise ship MV Hondius, where two deaths and one critically ill passenger were reported.