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New Zealand and Australian Virus-Ship Passengers Fly to Weeks of Quarantine in Perth
The passengers will undergo at least three weeks of testing and isolation, while one French evacuee has shown symptoms and is in strict isolation.
On Tuesday, six passengers—four Australian citizens, one permanent resident, and one New Zealander—arrived in Perth and entered mandatory quarantine at the Bullsbrook quarantine facility following a deadly hantavirus outbreak aboard the cruise ship MV Hondius.
The MV Hondius became the center of a deadly hantavirus outbreak that claimed three lives and infected eight others, prompting a complex government-supported repatriation operation from Spain's Canary Islands.
Constructed during the COVID-19 pandemic, the $400 million Bullsbrook quarantine facility will house passengers for three weeks while officials manage the virus's 42-day incubation period.
Federal Health Minister Mark Butler announced that hantavirus will be listed as a human disease under the Biosecurity Act, enabling a uniform national quarantine response rather than a state-based approach.
While no vaccines or specific treatments exist for the virus, health authorities emphasized public risk remains low because hantavirus typically requires very close contact for human-to-human transmission to occur.