This is The Guardian.

Over the weekend, reports emerged of a suspected hantavirus outbreak on a luxury cruise ship.

Two cases of hanta virus have been formally confirmed after three people died in a suspected outbreak on

a cruise ship off the coast of West Africa.

Traveling from Argentina to the Cape Verde Islands, another four suspected cases were then identified

on the MV Hondias.

The World Health Organization has now stated it believes there may be some human-to-human transmission among very close contacts.

A medical personnel have boarded the ship.

Human infections are rare, but the virus was also thought to be behind the death of actor Gene Hackman's wife, Betsy Arakawa, last year.

The medical investigator saying an autopsy shows 65-year-old Arakawa died of Hanta virus.

So what is Hanta virus?

How is it transmitted?

And how dangerous is it?

From The Guardian, I'm Madeline Finley, and this is Science Weekly.

Thank you. The Guardian, I'm Madeline Finley, and this is Science Weekly. Professor Jonathan Ball, your Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Tropical Disease Biology at Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.

First of all, what is hantavirus? Okay, so hantavirus is a virus that circulates widely in rodents.

There are different species of hantavirus across all continents except Antarctica, although there may well be some rodents living there

that could possibly harbour antivirus. I'm not sure we've extensively checked. But essentially,

we can divide the hantoviruses into two main groups, the new world hantoviruses, which

mainly are found in the Americas, for example, and the old world hantoviruses which mainly are found in the Americas for example and the old

world hantoviruses which are in places like Africa, Asia and also Europe. The new world

hantor viruses can cause what we call a hant syndrome, which is quite a severe respiratory problem.

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