CAPE VERDE — There are four Canadians on board a cruise ship where a suspected hantavirus outbreak has killed three passengers.

The MV Hondius was on a polar cruise from Argentina to Antarctica and several South Atlantic islands when some passengers started experiencing symptoms.

Hantavirus is a rodent-borne illness spread by contact with rodents or their urine, saliva or droppings, and the World Health Organization says the rare virus can spread between people.

Oceanwide Expeditions published a list of the nationalities of people on board the ship, including four passengers who are Canadian.

The company says two crew members currently require medical attention and nobody else on the ship seems to be ill.

The ship is waiting for help off the shore of Cape Verde.

WHO: COORDINATING A MULTI-COUNTRY RESPONSE

It was unclear how an outbreak could have started, and the WHO said it was investigating while working to coordinate the evacuation of two sick crew members. Another sick person — a British man evacuated to South Africa on April 27 — is the only one to have tested positive for the virus, authorities said. He is in critical condition and isolated in intensive care, according to local health officials.

The body of one of the passengers who died — a German — remains on the ship, according to an Oceanwide Expeditions statement. A 70-year-old Dutch man died onboard April 11, and his 69-year-old wife died later after leaving the ship, officials said.

Oceanwide said it was still awaiting permission from local authorities in Cape Verde to evacuate passengers and crew members and it would consider moving to one of the Spanish islands of Las Palmas or Tenerife.

The Dutch Foreign Ministry said it was also looking into evacuating some people from the ship.

A May 4 statement at Oceanside Expeditions’ site says: “We can confirm that guests will not be disembarking in Cape Verde, except for the three individuals who are planned to be medically evacuated. At this stage, a definitive disembarkation point for the remaining guests on board m/v Hondius has not been finalized. Sailing on to Las Palmas or Tenerife is being considered, where further medical screening and handling could take place, organized and supervised by the WHO and Dutch health services.”

WHO said it was working with local authorities and Oceanwide to conduct a “full public health risk assessment.”

“Detailed investigations are ongoing, including further laboratory testing, and epidemiological investigations,” WHO said. “Medical care and support are being provided to passengers and crew.”

WHO said that while only one case was confirmed through tests, the other five cases — the three deaths and two ill crew members — were suspected to be hantavirus.

The ship left Ushuaia in southern Argentina on April 1, according to Argentine provincial authorities, for its cruise to Antarctica, the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and other isolated islands in the South Atlantic.

While Oceanwide Expeditions didn’t specify this trip’s itinerary, the company advertises 33-night or 43-night “Atlantic Odyssey” cruises on the Hondius.

The ship has 80 cabins and a capacity of 170 passengers, and it typically travels with about 70 crew members, including a doctor, the company said.

The Dutch man was the first victim, and he presented with fever, headache, abdominal pain and diarrhea, officials said. His body was taken off the vessel nearly two weeks later on the British territory of Saint Helena, some 1,200 miles (1,900 kilometres) off the African coast, and was awaiting repatriation.

His 69-year-old wife was transferred to South Africa at the same time but collapsed at a Johannesburg airport and died at a hospital, the South African Department of Health said.

The ship then sailed on to Ascension Island, an isolated Atlantic outpost about 1,300 kilometres to the north, where the sick British man was taken off the ship and evacuated to South Africa on April 27. He later tested positive for hantavirus.

There was no information from authorities on the possible source of the suspected outbreak. A previous hantavirus outbreak in southern Argentina in 2019 killed at least nine people. It prompted a judge to order dozens of residents of a remote town to stay in their homes for 30 days to halt the spread.

South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases was conducting contact tracing to identify whether people were exposed to infected cruise ship passengers. The 69-year-old woman who died was trying to catch a flight home to the Netherlands at Johannesburg’s main international airport, one of the busiest in Africa, when she collapsed.

But the health department urged people not to panic, saying WHO was “coordinating a multicountry response with all affected islands and countries to contain further spread of the disease.”

Hantavirus has no specific treatment or cure, but early medical attention can increase the chance of survival.

Hantaviruses cause two serious syndromes, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, affecting the lungs, and hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome, affecting the kidneys.

“While severe in some cases, it is not easily transmitted between people,” Dr. Hans Henri P. Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe, said in a statement Monday. “The risk to the wider public remains low. There is no need for panic or travel restrictions.”

With file from The Associated Press

Lead image caption: A view of the m/v Hondius Cruise ship anchored at a port in Praia, Cape Verde, May 4, 2026 (AP Photo/Arilson Almeida)