New Delhi, May 8 Hantavirus has a low rate of person‑to‑person spread and is unlikely to reach pandemic scale, and there are no widely reported or officially confirmed deaths in India linked to the current virus outbreak, a report said on Friday.
The report from Elara Capital said that the low transmissibility of hantavirus means that even though individual hantavirus infections can be severe, outbreaks tend to be localised and self-limiting.
Hantavirus infections remain rare globally, with no specific USFDA-approved vaccines or antiviral treatments available.
Hantaviruses are rodent‑borne RNA viruses that infect humans primarily through inhalation of aerosolised particles from rodent urine, droppings or saliva. The report added that only certain strains of Hantavirus, notably the Andes strain, have shown rare person‑to‑person transmission.
The report pointed out the stark difference between Hantavirus and SARS‑CoV‑2, causing COVID-19, which spread very fast and became a pandemic.
Two major clinical syndromes of Hantavirus have been noted globally. The first one is Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome in America, which leads to severe respiratory failure with mortality rates reaching 40–50 per cent.
Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome (HFRS) in Europe and Asia, which affects the kidneys and blood vessels, has up to 15 per cent mortality rates in severe cases.
A recent 2026 cluster aboard the cruise ship MV Hondius linked to the Andes strain has resulted in a small number of cases and three deaths, drawing attention to the disease but remaining limited in spread.
The first recognised outbreak of HPS occurred in 1993 in the Four Corners region of the US (Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado & Utah) and was caused by the Sin Nombre virus. There were 53 cases during that outbreak, with 32 deaths, reflecting a high fatality rate.
China has reported 2.1 lakh HFRS cases from 2004 to 2019, and around 1,855 related deaths.
In the United States, a total of 864 Hantavirus infections were reported between 1993 and 2022, with approximately 302 deaths.
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