KLM flight attendant tested negative for hantavirus: WHO

GENEVA – A flight attendant for the Dutch airline KLM who showed mild symptoms of hantavirus and was admitted to hospital in Amsterdam has tested negative for the virus, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on May 8.

The flight attendant was tested after she reportedly came into contact with a sickened cruise ship passenger who was taken off a KLM plane and later died of the virus in South Africa.

Asked about the test result, a spokeswoman for the WHO told AFP that the UN health agency had “received notification through our IHR (International Health Regulations) focal point that she tested negative”.

KLM said on May 6 that the passenger – the wife of the first person to die in the hantavirus outbreak on the MV Hondius cruise ship – had briefly been on a plane bound from Johannesburg to the Netherlands on April 25, but was removed before take-off.

The Dutch woman died on April 26 in a Johannesburg hospital and later tested positive for hantavirus.

She is among three people who have died in the outbreak on the cruise ship, which left from Ushuaia, Argentina on April 1, headed for Cape Verde.

“Due to the passenger’s medical condition at the time, the crew decided not to allow the passenger to travel on the flight,” KLM said. “After the passenger was removed from the aircraft, the flight departed for the Netherlands.”

The Dutch health authorities are contacting people on the flight “as a precaution”, KLM said in its statement.

People fearing or known to have contracted the virus are being treated or isolating in Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and South Africa. AFP