Brian Barrett: This is the first time I’ve thought about contact tracing in many years, and I was very happy not to think about it for so long, because it’s such a complex process and something that’s a really hard thing to do. Emily, given all this, given what the World Health Organization and other organizations have said, what is the level of concern here? It seems like I’m being cautious about it, but maybe I just haven’t wasted time, but I’m taking your point because maybe I’m just trying to make myself feel better.
Emily Mullin: No, I think you’re right. The hantavirus expert I spoke to said clusters of the Andes strain have been seen before, but there have not been major outbreaks. And these groups have tended to involve close contact over long periods of time with people suffering from the disease. This is a virus that does not spread as efficiently as other respiratory viruses, for example, the ones we are used to like Covid or flu. The symptoms of hantavirus are also usually quite severe. So this is not a virus, again, like Covid where a lot of people are walking around infected with the disease, spreading symptoms without even knowing about it. So that’s at least a bit of a relief, even though the flip side is that the disease is quite serious. So the World Health Organization says the risk to the general public is currently low, and it’s probably not another COVID situation.
Brian Barrett:Leah, how are we feeling?
leah figure: Not good, you guys. I don’t know. Are you kidding? How are you feeling? Maybe this is the moment for me to go, “Are you still with me?”
Brian Barrett: No, I was good, but then Emily probably hit so hard that I suddenly became a little more worried.
leah figure:Yeah, it was probably like swallowing.
Emily Mullin: That was me doing the editorial. The World Health Organization probably did not get involved.
Brian Barrett: Ok. What if they only have it in italics or big quotation marks? As if it’s “probably” okay.
leah figure: I don’t know, friends. I think, one, I’m thrilled that there are different types. And it brings me back to the armchair scientists in early COVID who were like, “No, no, no, it’s totally fine.” So to have it officially announced that, yes, this is a strain that can spread between humans, I think that’s at least doable. Gotta give that to me.
Brian Barrett:Oh, I guess that’s true. And I guess my open questions are, how long do these guys have to be on this ship before everyone says, “Okay, you can go now,” or do they send them back to shore and just isolate them for a certain amount of time? Contact tracing is worrying because again, I’m having flashbacks. But I think Emily, given the things you said about how this is different from COVID in important ways in terms of how quickly it can spread, how easily it can spread, especially now that we have systems in place to trace these contacts, I’m not too concerned yet.
<a href