MPs question airport screening after hantavirus case slips through
Three people have died while another — an elderly British man — is being treated in isolation at a hospital in Johannesburg.
MPs have questioned how South Africa’s health surveillance systems allowed a traveller potentially infected with hantavirus to enter the country.
Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi and senior officials from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases have been appearing before the Portfolio Committee on Health on Wednesday.
Officials confirmed two hantavirus cases and five suspected infections linked to a cruise ship that left Argentina on an expedition to small islands in the Atlantic.
Three people have died while another — an elderly British man — is being treated in isolation at a hospital in Johannesburg.
The wife of one of the victims boarded an Airlink flight from St Helena Island to OR Tambo International late last month.
She collapsed at the airport and died at a facility nearby.
Members of the health committee today raised concerns about how she was allowed to board a commercial flight to South Africa without proper containment protocols.
NICD explains rapid response but highlights detection challenges
The NICD's Professor Lucille Blumberg says her team worked as fast as they could.
" Within 24 hours of the notification coming that there was a concern about an outbreak on a ship, we had confirmed hantavirus. It is not a virus we see in this country. It is extremely rare person-to-person, but as we see with this outbreak, that is a possibility. We did not know about the person who came and collapsed at the airport.
“She was travelling, and she did not report illness before she left. So there was nothing to alert that she may have something."
Health authorities trace contacts as Hantavirus cases reach South Africa
Motsoaledi earlier confirmed that officials have so far traced 42 people who may have come into contact with the two hantavirus cases that have reached South African shores.
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