Health Care

5 things to know about the quarantined Americans from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship

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by Addy Bink - 05/11/26 12:23 PM ET

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by Addy Bink - 05/11/26 12:23 PM ET

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(NEXSTAR) – Eighteen people – 17 Americans and one British national – have returned to the U.S. after evacuating the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship MV Hondius on Sunday. They are now quarantined in either Nebraska or Georgia, as health officials monitor them for symptoms of the sometimes deadly virus.

One of 17 American passengers evacuated from the ship and flown to Nebraska also tested positive for the hantavirus but is not showing any symptoms, and another had mild symptoms, U.S. health officials said late Sunday.

During a Monday morning press conference, health officials maintained that the risk of hantavirus spreading as COVID did in the U.S. remains extremely low and that all precautions are being taken to contain the virus.

Here’s what to know.

Where are they staying?

Sixteen of those patients are now at the National Quarantine Center, the only one of its kind in the U.S., at the University of Nebraska, after arriving at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha aboard a repatriation flight overnight. The Omaha center was previously used for Ebola patients and early in the COVID pandemic.

- Nebraska Medicine’s Davis Global Center is seen on Sunday, May 10,2026 in Omaha, Neb. where American passengers from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship will quarantine. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

One patient, who had a positive test for hantavirus but is asymptomatic, is in the Biocontainment Unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, while the others are in quarantine.

Officials described the quarantine space as similar to a hotel, used for patients who are well and under observation. They have their own rooms and access to technology, officials explained, but they cannot “intermingle” or receive visits from those outside of the medical center.

The Biocontainment Unit is more like a hospital, equipped with medical care for patients who need it. Because hantavirus can cause patients to become very ill quickly, the capacity for the unit is currently around two to three beds, officials explained. With an airborne illness, like avian flu, capacity could increase to about 10.

Two more patients were transported to Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, as part of the accommodation contingency plan because one was experiencing mild symptoms. They were also staying in a Biocontainment Unit, though officials noted that the space can double as a quarantine area.

Who are the patients?

Officials on Monday could not provide specifics about each patient, but those staying in Nebraska range in age between their late 20s and late 70s or early 80s.

One of the patients is a British dual national who opted to come to the U.S.

- U.S. passengers from the cruise ship MV Hondius, affected by a hantavirus outbreak, arrive at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Davis Global Center, in Omaha, Neb. on Monday, May 11, 2026. (Nikos Frazier/Omaha World-Herald via Getty Images)

- Medical personnel escort U.S. passengers from the cruise ship MV Hondius, affected by a hantavirus outbreak, to awaiting shuttles at Eppley Airfield, in Omaha, Neb. on Monday, May 11, 2026. (Nikos Frazier/Omaha World-Herald via Getty Images)

- American passengers from the cruise ship, MV Hondius that was stricken with hantavirus, arrived in Omaha, Nebraska after flying from Tenerife, Spain on Monday, May 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Nick Ingram)

- Persons wearing hazmat suits are pictured as passengers board a plane bound for US carrying passengers evacuated from the Dutch flagged hantavirus-stricken cruise ship MV Hondius at the Tenerife Sur-Reina Sofia airport on the island of Tenerife in Spain’s Canary Islands on May 10, 2026. More than 90 of nearly 150 people on a cruise ship struck by a deadly hantavirus outbreak have been evacuated by repatriation flights from the Canary Islands, Spanish authorities said. (Photo by Antonio Sempere / AFP via Getty Images)

- Passengers board a plane bound for US carrying passengers evacuated from the Dutch flagged hantavirus-stricken cruise ship MV Hondius at the Tenerife Sur-Reina Sofia airport on the island of Tenerife in Spain’s Canary Islands on May 10, 2026. More than 90 of nearly 150 people on a cruise ship struck by a deadly hantavirus outbreak have been evacuated by repatriation flights from the Canary Islands, Spanish authorities said. (Photo by Antonio Sempere / AFP via Getty Images)

- Passengers board a plane bound for US carrying passengers evacuated from the Dutch flagged hantavirus-stricken cruise shi