Seven people aboard a cruise ship may have gotten hantavirus, a deadly illness more often associated⁽¹⁾ with breathing in desert or other land dust. How could that happen?

      一艘游轮上已有七人疑似感染汉坦病毒。这种致命疾病通常与吸入沙漠或其他陆地扬尘有关。这场疫情为何会在船上发生？

     When ship outbreaks make the news, the culprit⁽²⁾ tends to be norovirus or the virus that causes COVID-19. Now, though, the cruise ship MV Hondius is moored⁽³⁾ off the coast of Cape Verde in Africa with ill passengers and crew aboard. Hantavirus, a group of viruses that sometimes infects people who breathe in rodent excrement, may have killed three people and sickened four others.

       船舶聚集性疫情登上新闻时，元凶往往是诺如病毒或新冠病毒。但如今，“洪迪厄斯号” 游轮停泊在非洲佛得角海岸附近，船上多名乘客和船员出现不适。汉坦病毒是一类病毒，人若吸入啮齿动物排泄物微粒就可能被感染；此次疫情已造成三人死亡、四人染病。

      Risk to the general public is low, Maria Van Kerkhove, the World Health Organization’s director of Epidemic and Pandemic Preparedness and Prevention, said in a news briefing May 4. Contact tracing, laboratory tests and other work is ongoing, she said. “Our priority is to keep the passengers and the crew safe and healthy while limiting the spread of this virus.”

      世界卫生组织流行病和大流行防范与预防司司长玛丽亚・范凯尔克霍夫于5月4日新闻发布会上表示：普通民众面临的感染风险较低。她称，目前密切接触者追踪、实验室检测等相关工作仍在进行中。“我们的首要任务是保障乘客和船员的安全健康，同时遏制病毒传播。”

      Hantavirus has been confirmed in two passengers. One, a British citizen who was evacuated⁽⁴⁾ to South Africa, was the first to test positive for hantavirus, according to Oceanwide Expeditions, the company that runs the cruise line. On May 5, WHO confirmed that one of the dead passengers, a 69-year-old Dutch woman whose husband died on board first, was also infected. Another person had a mild fever but now has no symptoms, Van Kerkhove said in a news briefing May 5. That person is being considered a suspected⁽⁵⁾ case, bringing the count to seven.

已有两名乘客确诊感染汉坦病毒。据运营该游轮的远洋探险公司消息，一名被疏散至南非的英国公民是首例核酸阳性病例。5月5日，世卫组织证实一名遇难乘客也已确诊，这位 69岁荷兰女性的丈夫最先在船上离世。范凯尔克霍夫在5月5日发布会上补充，另有一人曾轻微发烧，目前已无任何症状，被列为疑似病例。至此，疑似及确诊病例总数达7例。

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