Ireland's Chief Medical Officer, Professor Mary Horgan, joined Florence in the news2day studio to tell us about a rare hantavirus outbreak - it's time for another news2day Explainer.
Press play on the image above to watch the Explainer in full and read on for the Q&A.
Over the past week you've probably heard mention of a virus called the hantavirus. It was in the news because some people on a cruise ship got ill and died.
The ship, named the MV Hondius, had been travelling from Argentina and the Antarctic region to the Canary Islands. All the passengers from the ship have now been returned to their countries, including two Irish people who are well but are in a hospital unit here.
How do people get infected by it?
People get infected if they have any contact with rats that are infected, if they inhale their poop or urine. they can get infected that way. But it's very, very unusual for a person to transmit it to, or send it on, to another person. We really don't see it in the community at all. So, it's totally different than COVID - it's really rare.
It is rare, should it be something that people or any of our viewers should be worried about?
No, they shouldn't be worried about it. There were very, very few people in the whole world infected with this, and it really was confined to the people, a small number of people on that ship. Once they disembarked and people returned to their countries, all the proper procedures to contain the infection were put in place. So, I'm happy to say that the two people that returned to Ireland were done so in a very safe and very smooth manner.
The two people in Ireland are now in the hospital. Can you tell me how they're containing the virus?
What we do is put them in quarantine. What that means is just isolate them in case they have any germs, we are just really cautious and want to keep them confined. Of course, we support them in every other way, just making sure that they're OK. But thankfully, they're in good health at this point in time.
And in other countries, what is being done to contain it there?
The same thing, we follow guidelines that are issued by people like the WHO, big organisations that tell us exactly what to do, whether these people need to wear masks or not. But there are really, really strong procedures put in place to contain the infection so that it doesn't spread. And the likelihood of spread is really, really low.
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