Hantavirus latest updates: Suspected case at New York high school not linked to cruise ship

An exterior view of Nebraska Medicine’s Davis Global Center in Omaha, Neb.

Nebraska Medicine’s Davis Global Center, where most of the American passengers from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship have been quarantined.

(ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Good morning, and welcome back to our live blog coverage.

Eighteen Americans who disembarked from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship are currently receiving treatment at U.S. facilities in a bid to contain the virus.

Of those, 16 people who traveled on the MV Hondius are being monitored at the National Quarantine Center in Omaha, Neb. The two remaining passengers, including one who is symptomatic, were sent to Emory University in Atlanta.

However, the mildly symptomatic U.S. passenger who was taken to the biocontainment unit in Atlanta has tested negative for hantavirus, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

The 16 other passengers who are being monitored in Nebraska are asymptomatic, including one person who previously tested positive for hantavirus.

Kansas became the ninth state to monitor residents for potential hantavirus exposure, with health officials observing three people who had close contact with someone on the cruise ship who later tested positive.

Worldwide, there are a total of 11 hantavirus cases reported. The latest is a 25-year-old Italian from the southern region of Calabria, who had been placed in quarantine after traveling on a Dutch KLM flight alongside a woman who later died from a hantavirus infection.

The World Health Organization has stressed that while it expects more cases to arise, “there is no sign that we are seeing the start of a larger outbreak.”