British passengers from a cruise ship affected by a hantavirus outbreak are set to be repatriated to the UK, where they will be transferred to the isolation facility at Arrowe Park Hospital on the Wirral.
The Merseyside hospital gained prominence as the nation’s initial quarantine site for British citizens returning from Wuhan, China, at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in January 2020.
Twenty-two British nationals, comprising both passengers and crew from the MV Hondius, are anticipated to arrive in Tenerife, one of Spain’s Canary Islands, this Sunday.
Upon docking, officials from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) and the Foreign Office will meet the vessel.
Britons on board will undergo testing for hantavirus before they are permitted to disembark.
Those who test negative and exhibit no symptoms will then be transported via a dedicated repatriation flight, staffed by medical professionals, back to the UK. The World Health Organisation (WHO) confirmed on Saturday that there were no symptomatic passengers currently aboard the ship.
Emergency services in the north west of England said they expected the passengers to be kept in a “managed setting” for up to 72 hours.
Public health specialists will then assess whether they can isolate at home or at another suitable location based on their living arrangements.
Britons returning to the UK will stay in self-isolation for 45 days and will not be allowed to take public transport to their homes.
A joint statement from NHS England North West, NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Integrated Care Board, Merseyside Police, North West Ambulance Service, and Wirral Council said: “Organisations across Cheshire and Merseyside are working closely with colleagues from the UK Health Security Agency and other government bodies to support the repatriation of passengers from MV Hondius.
“In line with advice from the UK Health Security Agency, on arrival they will be taken to a managed setting for clinical assessment and testing. We expect this initial stay to be up to 72 hours.
“Following this, public health specialists will assess whether they can isolate at home or at another suitable location, based on their living arrangements.
“The risk to the general population remains very low.”
The WHO said there had been six confirmed hantavirus cases linked to the MV Hondius ship and that four patients were currently in hospital.
It added that a total of eight cases, including three deaths, had been reported – with one suspected case being reclassified after testing negative for hantavirus.
The UN agency has sought to reassure “worried” Tenerife residents that they will not encounter passengers of the hantavirus-hit cruise ship set to dock on their island.
In a letter addressed to the people of Tenerife, WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he knew residents were “worried”.
He said the virus was “serious” but the outbreak was “not another Covid” and the “current public health risk from hantavirus remains low”.
He added: “Spain’s authorities have prepared a careful, step-by-step plan: passengers will be ferried ashore at the industrial port of Granadilla, far from residential areas, in sealed, guarded vehicles, through a completely cordoned-off corridor, and repatriated directly to their home countries.
“You will not encounter them. Your families will not encounter them.
“Nearly 150 people from 23 countries have been at sea for weeks, some of them grieving, all of them frightened, all of them longing for home.
“Tenerife has been chosen because it has the medical capacity, the infrastructure, and the humanity to help them reach safety.”
Two British men are currently being treated for hantavirus in the Netherlands and Johannesburg, South Africa, while a third British man with symptoms is being cared for on the remote South Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha.
In total, the Foreign Office said 30 passengers and crew from the MV Hondius are British, with 22 still on board the vessel.
The outbreak has been connected to a birdwatching expedition in Argentina which two of the passengers went on before boarding the ship.
