Dr. Stephen Kornfeld was holidaying on the ship when he tested positive for the virus, which causes a fever, extreme fatigue and muscle weakness
A US cancer doctor has revealed he is the American passenger who caught hantavirus on board the bug-ridden Hondius cruise ship.
Dr. Stephen Kornfeld was holidaying on the ship when he tested positive for the infection, which causes a fever, extreme fatigue and muscle weakness. Speaking for the first time since the ordeal, he told CNN: “I feel great. I feel wonderful, 100%.”
The medic, who is currently quarantining in a secure hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, thinks he caught the virus after volunteering to help sick passengers when the ship’s doctor fell ill. He and several staff members took a number of swabs in early May and his came back faintly positive.
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Asked about his time in quarantine, Dr Kornfeld said: “I’m here to be monitored closely and this is a very secure facility, so if I am to get sick and spill virus, there’s no way this virus is getting out of this building. The room is a hospital room, it looks just like a hospital room anywhere in the country.
“It’s got the usual equipment and a very comfortable hospital bed. I think all of the biocontainment is the multiple layers outside this room, the many doors, and the clean room, and where people dispose of things. The doctors come in, the nurses come in. I’m on WhatsApp all the time. It’s really amazing how quickly time flies.”
On his symptoms, he added: “A number of us came down with a flu-like illness or the ship’s flu. I had three days of night sweats, a lot of chills, some mild respiratory [issues] and a lot of fatigue. And while the night sweats and the respiratory stuff cleared up pretty quickly, the fatigue lingered for two and a half weeks.
“I was still able to do all the ship activities. At the time, it felt like this is just some virus and now, in retrospect, there was a question, could it have been hantavirus? But it’s just speculation.” Kornfeld told how medical staff at the facility wear “full hazmat gear or proper protective gear,” adding: “I just see a pair of eyes.”
Passengers suspected of having the virus – which is carried by rodents – have been told to quarantine for 42 days. In some cases, symptoms can take up to eight weeks to appear, According to the World Health Organisation (WHO). Three people have died, with two confirmed to have had the virus. They include an elderly Dutch man who died before being tested, his wife and a German woman.
In the UK, 22 people are being quarantined at Merseyside’s Arrowe Park Hospital. A French woman who also contracted the virus while on the ship is critically ill and relying on an artificial lung, a doctor treating her has said. On Monday, a South African health ministry spokesperson said a British man with the virus who was being treated in a hospital there is “improving, gradually” but is “still ill.”
