ALL 122 passengers on a cruise ship hit by a suspected hantavirus outbreak disembarked on Monday at a port in the Canary Islands, the Dutch operator of the cruise ship said.
The Japanese Foreign Ministry said the same day that the sole Japanese passenger on the vessel has arrived in Britain on a flight chartered by the British government and will undergo health monitoring there for up to 45 days, adding the person is in good health.
The MV Hondius, now carrying 27 crew members, is headed for Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
After the cruise ship arrived at the Port of Granadilla on the Spanish island of Tenerife on Sunday, passengers cleared health screenings and left the ship. They subsequently began returning home on flights arranged by their home countries and others.
The World Health Organization said on Monday the number of people infected with hantavirus rose to seven after a French national who disembarked was newly confirmed infected.
Although an American national has reportedly tested positive, the person is not included in the tally because the WHO deems further analysis necessary.
The cruise ship left Argentina on 1 April and had planned to travel through the Antarctic Circle before heading for Cape Verde, an island country off the west coast of Africa.
But the ship was denied entry by Cape Verde following reports of the suspected hantavirus outbreak and left the island’s coast on Wednesday. — Kyodo