Prisoner At San Quentin May Have Hantavirus, Authorities Say

A situation successful California said connected Wednesday that an inmate has perchance contracted hantavirus.

The San Quentin Rehabilitation Center confirmed that a 38-year-old inmate astatine nan installation has contracted a imaginable lawsuit of hantavirus. The business was first reported connected Monday, but nan situation confirmed connected Wednesday that nan unwellness was being treated arsenic a possible hantavirus infection.

Prison officials said that they do not judge nan microorganism was dispersed person-to-person, and it has not announced a quarantine, according to ABC 7.

The inmate is reportedly successful unchangeable condition.

While nan situation does person aesculapian facilities, an charismatic told nan broadcaster that she did not cognize if nan inmate was being treated astatine nan installation aliases had been returned to his cell.

Prison officials said nary different imaginable hantavirus cases person been identified. The situation houses much than 3,000 inmates.

"The wellness and information of nan incarcerated organization and unit stay CDCR's apical priority," a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesperson told nan San Francisco Chronicle.

Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome is rare, but tin origin superior respiratory complications. The information has a 30 to 40 percent mortality rate.

According to nan California Department of Public Health, location is nary antiviral treatment.

Hantavirus surged into nan public's consciousness successful May aft several group connected a cruise vessel fell ill — and 3 died — pursuing a hantavirus outbreak.

Enclosed spaces — for illustration cruise ships and prisons — are particularly susceptible to nan dispersed of contagious diseases. During nan Covid-19 pandemic, nan unwellness dispersed to much than half a cardinal US inmates and killed astir 3,000, according to nan Prison Policy Institute.

The astir communal forms of hantavirus do not dispersed person-to-person and require personification to respire successful contaminated particles from rodent feces aliases urine aliases to touch a contaminated aboveground earlier it tin spread. A uncommon version of nan microorganism tin dispersed betwixt people, but moreover that version requires important vulnerability to an infected individual's bodily fluids.