Nowadays coronavirus outbreak has taken the whole world by storm, and health officials are trying very hard to produce the cure, but now another virus is also tending to take its ugly turn.
A man has from Yunnan province of China, died after testing positive to Hantavirus. According to China’s Global Times report, the man infected from the virus died while on his way back for work to Shandong Province on a chartered bus. There were a total of 32 other people who were on the same bus and now also tested for the virus.
As the news went out on social media, people are now freaking out as COVID-19 is already creating crises among people around the globe.
Unlike coronavirus, hantavirus, on the other hand, is not airborne as it can spread to people only if they come in contact with urine, feces, as well as the saliva of rodents or else the less frequently, bite from an infected host.
What is Hantavirus?
A Hantavirus which is also known as orthohantavirus is a single-stranded, enveloped, RNA virus, a family of viruses which is mainly spread by rodents and can cause wide-ranging diseases in people. These viruses usually infect rodents, but at the same time, it does not cause disease in them.
Humans may become infected with hantaviruses when they come in contact with rodent urine, saliva, or else its feces. In some cases, the strains cause potentially fatal diseases in humans such as hantavirus hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS).
The name of this virus i.e., Hantavirus is named for the Hantan River area situated in South Korea where an early outbreak of this virus was observed and was isolated in the year 1976 by Ho-Wang Lee.
Hantavirus Symptoms
Some of the early symptoms of HPS consist of fatigue, fever, as well as muscle aches. Other than that, the infected host will also feel headaches, dizziness, chills and abdominal problems. If it is not treated immediately or left untreated, then it can lead to coughing along with shortness of breath and sometimes, it can be fatal, with a mortality rate of 38 percent, as per to CDC.
The initial symptoms of HFRS, on the other hand, also remain the same and can cause low blood pressure, acute shock, vascular leakage, as well as acute kidney failure.
Centre for Disease Control and Prevention on its website, said, “Rodent infestation in and around the home remains the primary risk for hantavirus exposure.” The statement further added that even the healthy people are at risk for “Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) infection if it is exposed to the virus.”
About half of all HPS patients experience these early symptoms of this virus which consist of fever, headache, light-headedness, muscle pain, chills and abdominal issues and pain, sickness, vomiting, diarrhea. The late symptoms, on the other hand, consist of lungs fill with fluid and shortness of breath.
