As health officials continue monitoring a hantavirus outbreak tied to the Dutch expedition cruise ship MV Hondius, many people are asking the same question: Could this spread more broadly?

随着卫生官员继续监测与荷兰探险游轮MV Hondius有关的汉坦病毒爆发，许多人都在问同样的问题：这种病毒会传播得更广泛吗？

The outbreak involves the Andes strain, a rare form of the virus that can spread between people through close contact, though public health officials say the overall risk to the public remains low. Even so, the situation has stirred memories of the early days of COVID-19, especially as countries coordinate quarantines, monitoring and contact tracing tied to passengers aboard the ship.

此次疫情涉及安第斯菌株，这是一种罕见的病毒，可以通过密切接触在人与人之间传播，但公共卫生官员表示，对公众的总体风险仍然很低。即便如此，这种情况还是勾起了人们对COVID-19早期的回忆，特别是在各国协调隔离、监测和追踪与船上乘客有关的接触者的时候。

To put the headlines into perspective, we turned to Stephen Waterman, M.D., MPH, a clinical professor at the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Human Longevity Science at UC San Diego. Waterman is a former quarantine medical officer for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with experience in cruise ship outbreaks and infectious disease response.

为了正确看待这些头条新闻，我们求助于Stephen Waterman，医学博士，公共卫生硕士，加州大学圣地亚哥分校Herbert Wertheim公共卫生和人类长寿科学学院的临床教授。沃特曼是美国疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）的前检疫医学官员，在游轮爆发和传染病应对方面有经验。

Could hantavirus spread like COVID-19 or become something travelers should be worried about as we head into peak travel season?

随着我们进入旅游旺季，汉坦病毒会像COVID-19一样传播，还是会成为旅行者应该担心的事情？

“I think the big question on people’s minds, coming out of COVID, is whether this is the start of another worldwide infectious disease problem that could spread broadly and cause a high number of deaths. This particular strain — the Andes strain found in South America — is a serious disease. It has a much higher mortality rate than COVID.

“我认为，人们心中最大的问题是，这是否是另一场可能广泛传播并导致大量死亡的全球传染病问题的开始。这种特殊的菌株——在南美洲发现的安第斯菌株——是一种严重的疾病。它的死亡率比COVID高得多。

But the answer that the World Health Organization, CDC and public health experts are giving is that this is not a situation likely to lead to large worldwide spread. This disease is much harder to transmit than COVID, influenza or measles.

但世界卫生组织、疾病预防控制中心和公共卫生专家给出的答案是，这种情况不太可能导致大规模的全球传播。这种疾病比COVID、流感或麻疹更难传播。

Hantavirus is mainly transmitted through close contact with rodents or rodent secretions, and that’s probably how the first person on the cruise ship became infected. He had spent quite a long time in South America in an area where he could have been exposed to rodents.

汉坦病毒主要通过与啮齿动物或啮齿动物分泌物的密切接触传播，这可能是游轮上第一个人被感染的原因。他在南美待了很长一段时间，在那里他可能会接触到啮齿动物。

What’s unusual here is that the Andes strain is the only hantavirus strain known to sometimes spread person to person, and that’s likely what happened on the ship unless there was some kind of rodent exposure onboard, which seems less likely given the sanitation standards on cruise vessels.

不同寻常的是，安第斯毒株是已知的唯一一种有时会在人与人之间传播的汉坦病毒毒株，这很可能是在船上发生的，除非船上有某种啮齿动物接触，考虑到游轮的卫生标准，这种可能性似乎不大。

But again, it’s nothing like the transmission you see with COVID or influenza. In South America, there are only a few dozen cases a year in countries like Argentina and Chile. It’s not a disease that typically turns into large outbreaks affecting significant portions of the population.

I think the cruise ship aspect is part of why this has captured so much attention. There are overtones of COVID and cruise ships that people remember, so naturally people are asking whether this could become something bigger.

但同样，这与你在COVID或流感中看到的传播不同。在南美洲，阿根廷和智利等国每年只有几十例病例。这种疾病通常不会发展成影响大部分人口的大规模爆发。

This is the first cruise ship outbreak of hantavirus that I’m aware of, so it absolutely needs to be investigated carefully. There are still unanswered questions about person-to-person spread with this strain, and public health agencies will be following cases closely. But I think it’s likely that this will remain limited to a relatively small number of people connected to the ship.

这是我所知道的第一次汉坦病毒在游轮上爆发，所以绝对需要仔细调查。关于这种菌株的人际传播仍有悬而未决的问题，公共卫生机构将密切关注病例。但我认为，这可能仍将局限于与这艘船有关的相对较少的人。

And for people worried about summer travel or cruise vacations, I would not say this changes the overall safety of cruise travel. Cruise ships already have strong sanitation and monitoring programs because they’ve dealt with infectious disease outbreaks before, particularly norovirus.

对于那些担心夏季旅行或邮轮假期的人，我不会说这改变了邮轮旅行的整体安全性。游轮已经有了强大的卫生和监测程序，因为它们以前处理过传染病的爆发，特别是诺如病毒。

Cruise ships do occasionally have outbreaks because there’s close contact and a lot of social interaction, but cruise ship travel is safe from an infectious disease standpoint.”

游轮偶尔会爆发疫情，因为有密切接触和大量的社会互动，但从传染病的角度来看，游轮旅行是安全的。”

Waterman added that outbreaks like this also underscore the importance of strong international public health coordination and disease monitoring. Infectious diseases, he noted, do not respect national borders — one reason health agencies around the world continue to closely track emerging outbreaks even when the overall public risk remains low.

沃特曼补充说，像这样的疫情也强调了强有力的国际公共卫生协调和疾病监测的重要性。他指出，传染病不受国界的限制，这是世界各地的卫生机构继续密切跟踪新爆发疫情的一个原因，即使在总体公共风险仍然很低的情况下。