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A French passenger evacuated from a Dutch cruise ship at the center of a deadly hantavirus outbreak displayed symptoms of the disease during a repatriation flight Sunday, raising fresh alarm as international efforts to remove hundreds of travelers from the vessel off Spain's Canary Islands entered their second day.
French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said one of five French nationals flown back to Paris from the MV Hondius showed symptoms mid-flight and was placed in strict isolation upon landing, along with the other four passengers. France announced it would introduce contact isolation measures "to protect the general population," Lecornu said, as medical examinations and testing of all five individuals got underway.
The development came hours after Spanish Health Minister Monica Garcia said all passengers and crew aboard the Dutch-flagged expedition vessel were asymptomatic following health inspections conducted after the ship docked Sunday morning in the archipelago, located close to the West African coast.
Garcia announced Sunday night that 94 people of 19 nationalities, among them Dutch, Canadian, and Turkish citizens, had been removed from the vessel during the first day of operations. The first to disembark were 14 Spanish nationals, transported by military aircraft to Madrid and transferred to a military hospital for quarantine and testing.
World Health Organization pandemic preparedness chief Maria Van Kerkhove said evacuation efforts would resume Monday morning and were expected to conclude by 7 p.m. local time. Approximately 30 crew members are to remain aboard the Hondius to sail it back to the Netherlands, where the ship will be disinfected upon arrival.
The operation unfolded against a backdrop of local resistance. Fernando Clavijo, the Canary Islands' regional president, raised objections to the evacuations being conducted in the archipelago. Spanish officials sought to defuse concerns that infected rodents might reach shore from the ship, stating the likelihood of an Andean rodent swimming to the Canary coast was "zero."
The outbreak aboard the Hondius has killed three people and infected several others. Hantavirus is a rare disease typically transmitted through contact with infected rodents or their droppings. The strain implicated in this outbreak is notable for its capacity to spread between humans, a characteristic that distinguishes it from most hantavirus variants and has heightened concern among health authorities.
The Hondius, an expedition cruise ship designed for voyages to remote regions, had been operating near the Canary Islands when the outbreak was identified. The vessel's proximity to the Spanish archipelago made it a staging point for the multinational evacuation.
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