Twenty-two passengers evacuated from the hantavirus-hit MV Hondius in Tenerife at the weekend are being monitored at Arrowe Park hospital on the Wirral for 72 hours before doctors decide whether they can go home or isolate elsewhere for up to 45 days.
Among them are 20 British people, one German who lives in the UK and one Japanese national. None is showing symptoms of hantavirus, and hospital staff said the illness is not spread through everyday social contact, adding there is no reason for local residents to be concerned. The hospital described the setup as a planned, controlled and carefully managed arrangement.
The passengers are staying in a staff accommodation block away from the main hospital, a familiar role for Arrowe Park after it was last used as a quarantine site in the early days of the Covid pandemic. That history has given the Wirral hospital an unusual place in recent public health memory, and it is why the new arrivals are being watched so closely now, even though the virus involved is different.
Matt Raw, who was evacuated from China to Arrowe Park in early 2020 with about 80 other British citizens, said quarantine there was made more bearable by the practicalities of daily life. He said people had access to television, the internet and social media, and could use a courtyard to get some fresh air. He also recalled a large supply of games and jigsaws donated by people in Wirral, along with food and drinks ordered through a concierge service.
Raw said the accommodation used then was essentially student housing, with three bedrooms to a suite and a communal lounge and kitchen. He said he would not be surprised if the current passengers have suites to themselves, given the smaller number involved this time. What mattered most, he said, was that people had enough to do while living with the uncertainty of exposure to something new.
That uncertainty is the sharp edge of the latest operation. Arrowe Park is not treating symptoms because there are none, but keeping the group in place long enough for doctors to determine whether each passenger can leave for home isolation or another location. For now, the priority is containment without alarm, and the hospital says the public has no reason to worry.
