90-Second Read: Experts wonder ‘Where is the CDC?’ as a Hantavirus outbreak unfolds on a cruise ship

Despite a cruise ship outbreak of a rare rodent-borne illness, global health officials say the risk to the general public remains low because Hantavirus germs do not easily spread between people. To experts, the situation aboard a cruise ship has not spiraled because, unlike COVID-19 or measles or the flu, Hantavirus does not spread easily. The Hantavirus outbreak is "a sentinel event" that speaks to "how well the country is prepared for a disease threat. A Spanish Civil Guard officer inspects the area where passengers from the MV Hondius cruise ship are expected to arrive at the port of Granadilla in Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain, Saturday, May 9, 2026. It has been health experts in other countries, not the United States, who have been dealing primarily with the outbreak in.

The CDC's diminished role in this outbreak is an indicator the agency is no longer the force in international health or the protector of domestic health that it once was, some experts said. Hantavirus was first identified as a cause of sickness of one of the cases on May 2. In interviews this week, some experts made a comparison with a 2020 incident involving the Diamond Princess, a cruise ship docked in Japan that became the setting of one of the first large COVID-19 outbreaks outside of China. Preparations were underway at Granadilla port, where the vessel is expected to arrive on Sunday. Early last month, a 70-year-old Dutch man developed a feverish illness on a cruise ship traveling from Argentina to Antarctica and some islands in the South Atlantic.

Health officials confirmed the deployment of a team to Spain's Canary Islands, where the ship was expected to arrive early Sunday local time, to meet the Americans onboard. The World Health Organization swung into action and by Monday was calling it an outbreak. It made the risk assessment that has told people the outbreak is not a pandemic threat. Kennedy Jr., said he was working to "restore the CDC's focus on infectious disease, invest in innovation, and rebuild trust through integrity and transparency." The CDC has not been completely silent on Hantavirus. The CDC is not even a player," said Lawrence Gostin, an international public health expert at Georgetown University.

The CDC acted as a mainstay of any international investigation, providing staff and expertise to help unravel any outbreak mystery, develop ways to control it and communicate to the public what they should know and how they should worry. The CDC also is "monitoring the health status and preparing medical support for all of the American passengers on the cruise. Arizona officials this week said they learned from the CDC that one of the Americans who left the ship — a person with no symptoms and not considered contagious — had already returned to the state. But federal health officials have mostly been tight-lipped, declining interview requests. Some aspects of the international response to the Diamond Princess were criticized, and it did not halt the outbreak or stop COVID-19's spread.