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View all search resultsPatient history key to hantavirus early detection
The hantavirus infection often causes symptoms that are also seen in other illnesses, which potentially make the disease to be misdiagnosed as other ‘milder’ diseases, health experts have said.
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Test tubes labelled “Hantavirus positive“ are held in this illustration taken on May 7. (Reuters/Dado Ruvic)
A
s early diagnosis may be difficult to determine whether someone is infected by hantavirus, experts urge health workers to look thoroughly at a patient’s history, including potential rodent exposure and history of travel to areas where outbreaks happen.
Among the early symptoms of hantavirus infections are fever and headache, which look a lot like other febrile or respiratory infections such as influenza and COVID-19, infectious disease specialist Lim Poh Lian of Singapore’s Communicable Diseases Agency (CDA) said.
She added clinicians should obtain a thorough patient history, with special attention to possible rodent exposure, occupational and environmental risks, travel history and contact with known cases in areas where hantavirus happens.
“In the context of the hantavirus [Andes strain] outbreak associated with MV Hondius, a history of epidemiological exposure to MV Hondius or to flights with symptomatic passengers from MV Hondius should be obtained for assessment,” Lim said in a webinar on May 12.
Concerns about hantavirus, the family of RNA viruses mainly carried by rodents, surfaced following reports received by the World Health Organization on May 2 about several passengers aboard Dutch vessel MV Hondius suffering from severe respiratory illness.
Several cases were later laboratory-confirmed as hantavirus infections, with at least three deaths.
Two Singaporean nationals who were on board the cruise ship were later suspected of being infected by the virus after sharing a flight with a confirmed hantavirus case from Saint Helena to Johannesburg and later died in South Africa. The two Singaporeans later tested negative for the virus.
