CDC Sends Teams to Spain, Nebraska for Hantavirus
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- CDC delayed its response to the hantavirus outbreak, issuing no health alerts or deploying investigators until late Friday.
- CDC deployed a team to Spain’s Canary Islands to meet American passengers and a second team to Offutt Air Force Base to evacuate Americans to a University of Nebraska quarantine center, and issued its first health alert to U.S. doctors.
- Lawrence Gostin of Georgetown University said the CDC is “not even a player,” a criticism echoed by Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, who called the outbreak a sentinel event highlighting unpreparedness.
- World Health Organization declared an outbreak on May 2 after a 70‑year‑old Dutch man on a cruise ship from Argentina to Antarctica died of hantavirus, followed by his wife and a German woman.
- President Donald Trump claimed the situation was “under very good control,” despite the CDC’s delayed involvement.
Why it matters: American travelers on the cruise face delayed medical evaluation, while the CDC’s inaction highlights weakened disease‑surveillance capacity, costing the U.S. credibility and potentially increasing hospital burden.
