A flight attendant has been hospitalized with a suspected hantavirus infection after she came in contact with one of the sickened MV Hondius cruise ship passengers who later died.
The KLM stewardess, who hasn’t been identified, was put in isolation in a hospital in Amsterdam late Wednesday to undergo testing, Dutch news outlet RTL Nieuws reported.
She had briefly come into contact with an elderly Dutch passenger who was deemed too sick to fly — and who then collapsed at the airport and later died.
The flight attendant was picked up from her home in the Dutch city Haarlem by medical crews after experiencing mild symptoms, health officials said.
The KLM staffer had come in contact with the Dutch woman who had been evacuated from the ship after her husband, 70, died on board amid the outbreak.
The sick 69-year-old woman had been transferred from the ship to Johannesburg, South Africa on April 25 — roughly two weeks after her husband’s death — so she could head back to the Netherlands for treatment.
She boarded the KLM flight for a “short time” — but was ultimately removed due to her ailing condition, according to the airline.
“Due to the passenger’s medical condition at the time, the crew decided not to allow the passenger to travel on the flight,” a KLM spokesperson said.
The elderly woman collapsed at the airport and died at a nearby hospital a day later.
Those on board the KLM flight, which later took off as planned, are being notified by Dutch health authorities, the airline said.
Here’s the latest on the deadly hantavirus outbreak on the Dutch cruise ship:
Three people — the Dutch couple and a German national — have already died in the outbreak on the MV Hondius.
Three sickened people, including an ex-British cop identified as Martin Anstee, were among those evacuated from the ship on Wednesday in hazmat suits.
The ship, which has been marooned off Cape Verde in West Africa for days with nearly 150 on board, is now en route to Spain so the others can disembark.
Countries worldwide, including the US, were now scrambling to trace people who had already left the cruise ship before the outbreak became known.
The virus found in the victims has been confirmed as the Andean strain, which can spread among humans through very close contact.
It usually spreads by inhaling contaminated rodent droppings.
Experts have stressed that human-to-human contagion is very rare and requires very close contact, but the outbreak has put health authorities on high alert.
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