{"id":646061,"date":"2026-05-07T14:01:59","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T12:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=646061"},"modified":"2026-05-07T14:23:48","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T12:23:48","slug":"major-airline-gives-statement-about-passenger-with-deadly-new-virus-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/business\/646061-major-airline-gives-statement-about-passenger-with-deadly-new-virus-in-south-africa.html","title":{"rendered":"Major airline gives statement about passenger with deadly new virus in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Airlink said it provided South Africa’s Department of Health with the passenger manifest of flight 4Z 132, which carried a person believed to have been infected with a rare strain of Hantavirus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The passenger succumbed to illness shortly after arriving in Johannesburg. Airlink told MyBroadband that it is actively contacting the other passengers who were aboard the flight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Wednesday, the World Health Organisation (WHO) called on passengers aboard the 25 April flight from St Helena to Johannesburg to contact local health authorities immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Airlink said it was not aware that an infected passenger was aboard and was only informed by the health department a week after the flight took place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Local public health authorities and the WHO said they were responding to several cases of Hantavirus among passengers aboard the MV Hondius cruise liner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three people who were aboard the cruise are confirmed to have died, and two others are in urgent medical care for symptoms believed to be related to the fatal disease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The passenger who passed away in Johannesburg, a 69-year-old woman, disembarked the cruise ship at St Helena and intended to fly back to the Netherlands after a stopover in Johannesburg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She was reportedly the widow of a 70-year-old man who passed away from the illness while still aboard the cruise ship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In accordance with health protocols, Airlink provided the Department of Health with the passenger manifest for contact tracing,” Airlink said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The manifest included the names, contact details and seating allocation of the passengers and crew.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Airlink said it operates in strict compliance with all public health and aviation regulations and requirements issued by the department and the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following the 25 April flight, the Airlink Embraer jet involved was taken to the company’s hangar and cleaned as part of its normal routine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was then returned to active service the following morning, before Airlink was alerted that the aircraft contained a passenger believed to be infected with the disease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

HEPA filters aboard aircraft to slow infection<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
ZS-YAJ, the aircraft involved in flight 4Z132. Image credit: Vishal Venugopal Aviation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

According to FlightRadar24 data, flight 4Z132 was operated by an Embraer E190AR aircraft, and the total flight time was 4 hours and 10 minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Airlink said that this particular type of jet was equipped with High Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) filters, which it said were similar to those used in hospital operating theatres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“These filters continually ‘scrub’ clean the cabin air, which is constantly renewed throughout a flight,” Airlink said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A BCMJ literature review from 2023 stated<\/span><\/a>\u00a0that HEPA filtration is beneficial for reducing bioaerosols, including SARS-CoV-2 and other re<\/span>spiratory pathogens, in the hospital environment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A systematic review conducted in 2021 identified 11 studies on the effectiveness of portable HEPA filters for eliminating airborne SARS-CoV-2,” it read.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A HEPA filter filters 99.97% of aerosols with a size of 0.15 \u03bcm, with even greater efficiency for other particle sizes (larger and smaller). SARS-CoV-2 is thought to be around 0.1 \u03bcm.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to an announcement<\/a> from the WHO, this particular strain of Hantavirus is also known as “Andes virus” and is endemic to South America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This strain first infected humans through contact with the urine, faeces, or saliva of rats that carried the virus. Although uncommon, human-to-human transmission has been reported with this strain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Infections were characterised by “fever, gastrointestinal symptoms, rapid progression to pneumonia, acute respiratory distress syndrome and shock,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The organisation assessed the current risk to the global population posed by the ongoing situation as “low,” but said it will continue monitoring and update the risk assessment as necessary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Airlink said that it has given the Department of Health the contact details of all aboard the flight to Johannesburg that carried the passenger infected with a rare strain of Hantavirus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341213,"featured_media":646069,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[46798,40842,105072,105073,105075,345,63753,105074],"class_list":["post-646061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-airlink","tag-department-of-health","tag-embraer","tag-hantavirus","tag-hepa-filters","tag-who","tag-world-health-organisation","tag-zs-yaj"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646061"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341213"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646061"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646061\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":646093,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646061\/revisions\/646093"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}