Two doctors with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Wednesday that the risk to Americans from the deadly hantavirus outbreak remains low, saying the agency is “engaged at every step.”
In a media briefing, they described the agency’s response, which has been criticized by some infectious disease and public health experts as taking a back seat to the World Health Organization and other groups.
“I want to start by saying hantavirus is a known pathogen,” said David Fitter, the CDC’s incident manager for the hantavirus response. “At this moment, I want to emphasize that the risk to the general public is low. Our top priority is with the passengers who are on the ship and American communities.”
Fitter went on to detail how CDC has reacted, saying that from the earliest stages of this outbreak, it has been working in close coordination with state and public health authorities, with federal partners as well as international health partners, including countries that have been affected.
“CDC activated our emergency response in Atlanta immediately and has more than 100 staff actively working on this response. Operationally, we’ve been engaged at every step,” he said.
Those steps included providing information to American passengers on board the ship traveling from Argentina toward Antarctica and deploying a CDC team to the Canary Islands whose members spoke with each U.S. citizen about potential exposure. Two team members flew back with passengers, some to the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit and Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.
“So far, our response has followed our playbook for swift action across federal, state, and local public health. The systems and partnerships that we’ve built exist precisely for situations like this,” Fitter said. “The work isn’t always visible, sharing information with state and local health departments and coordinating guidance and monitoring. But it never stops. It’s deliberate, it’s coordinated. It’s essential to keep our community safe.”
In Nebraska, a CDC team has been conducting health assessments of each passenger, asking them about their exposure to the confirmed cases while also monitoring temperature, screening for symptoms, and evaluating general wellness. The virus has a long incubation period, so the monitoring is 42 days, having started Monday.
“Our team has been working around-the-clock to ensure the health and safety of everyone involved,” said Brendan Jackson, CDC’s team lead in Nebraska and a medical epidemiologist.
Results are still being awaited on the passenger who had tested mildly positive before arriving in Nebraska. The CDC team wanted to retest there.
Some other passengers who have not tested positive are being monitored in their homes. The doctors declined to say where they are or how many they are, citing privacy concerns.
“We’re putting into action all of the things that we have in place to ensure that American communities remain safe and healthy. And what we really want to do is ensure that we’re also communicating about this,” Fitter said. “And we’ll continue to update the U.S. about everything that we are doing in multiple ways through our websites and other endeavors like this.”