The reason, according to him, is that the spread of the virus between people is very rare.
– We can't know one hundred percent, but based on how it has been in the past, it is probably a low risk, says Jonas Klingström, a professor who focuses on zoonotic viruses at Linköping University.
He researches how zoonotic viruses cause disease in humans, focusing primarily on hantaviruses and coronaviruses.
Despite the low risk, it is important to curb the infection due to the potential consequences of a pandemic, according to Klingström.
To break chains of infection, they are tracing those who were on the boat. They check early whether they have fallen ill or been infected, to see if they need to be isolated, he says.
He doesn't see any similarities between how the COVID pandemic broke out and how this hantavirus spreads.
No, not really. COVID was a completely unexpected event. It was a new virus that spread. Here it is a virus that has been known for 20–30 years and must have been around even longer.
He explains that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID, is also significantly more contagious than hantavirus. Relative to how many people were on the boat, only a few have been infected.
When there has been an outbreak of COVID on boats, many have become infected very quickly, says Jonas Klingström.
