WHO director arrives in Canary Islands to oversee hantavirus cruise evacuation: "This disease is not COVID"
Source: CBS News
Updated on: May 9, 2026 / 8:51 PM EDT
World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus arrived in Tenerife Saturday to personally oversee the painstaking process of evacuating more than 100 people from a cruise ship dealing with an outbreak of the rare and deadly hantavirus.
Addressing the people of the Canary Islands, where the ship will anchor off the coast of its largest island, the WHO chief said the public's concern is legitimate after what the world experienced in 2020 during the global coronavirus pandemic.
"This disease is not COVID," Tedros said, reiterating a letter he wrote earlier Saturday. "The risk to the local population is low."
Tedros said that the nature of the hantavirus is not the same as the coronavirus, but "that trauma is still in our minds." "That's why also I came here," he said. "To be on the side of the people because saying things from far could be easy. But I had to change my plans to come here because this is very, very important to the whole world and to the people of Tenerife as well."
Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hantavirus-cruise-evacuation-world-health-organization-hondius-canary-islands/
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Not to worry. There has been a contingency plan in place all along. The sick rats harboring this disease will be rounded up and collectively dispatched in a big ole blender the likes of which has never been seen. Bottoms up, MAHA!
