The Outbreak of Hysteria, not Hantavirus, and The Media’s Desperation for Your Attention

Here we go again. As a recovering biomedical scientist, I could not continue watching the media’s absurd level of pretend-panic and utter meltdown with their coverage of a localised cluster of hantavirus cases linked to the MV Hondius cruise ship, the headlines are already following a tired, panic-inducing script.

This sensationalism is not only misleading, but a dangerous distraction from more immediate social, geopolitical and economic issues that we all need to observe. This is yet another piece of evidence behind the urgency that compelled me to launch The Retort and The CEO Retort podcast.

But since I’m somewhat qualified to discuss this topic, let’s start with what public health experts and the World Health Organization (WHO) have stated remarkably clear:

The risk of a hantavirus pandemic is “absolutely low.”

Unlike COVID-19 or influenza, hantavirus is primarily a zoonotic disease. This means it is an infectious disease that has jumped from a non-human animal to humans. Zoonotic pathogens may be bacterial, viral or parasitic, and, in this case, the virus stays in rodents.

Despite the terrifying fatality rates often cited to grab clicks, the virus itself is incredibly fragile. Think of it like a soap bubble; as the virus is wrapped in a thin layer of fat that falls apart the moment it hits sunlight, fresh air, or a splash of household cleaner.

So, unlike a sturdy stomach bug that can survive on a park bench for a week, hantavirus usually dies off within hours of leaving its host. It is simply not built to survive a commute across a city. OK, enough with my puns.

On a serious note, catching this virus is not the same as catching a cold. You do not get hantavirus by walking past someone at the shops. It requires a heavy dose and a concentrated viral cloud or air contaminated with virus particles from infected rodents’ urine, droppings or saliva. So you would only find it in a cramped, unventilated space, like a closed-off ship cabin. In the open air, the virus thins out so quickly that it loses its ability to infect.

Even the “Andes” strain—the one the media loves to highlight because it can move from person to person—is remarkably low risk of catching compared to flu or COVID-19. Have a look at the table below and tell me if these figures look like a pandemic-level outbreak to you:

Hence, in the context of a modern public health infrastructure, the threat level for the general population remains at a “void-level”— effectively a non-event for the average citizen.

Yet, “The Next COVID” remains the clickbait of choice for major news outlets and influencers, especially in the US. By framing a rare, low-transmission virus as a global threat, the media fuels a cycle of misinformation that spreads faster than the virus itself.

By ignoring the basic scientific facts I shared with you above, the media machine is not just being “cautious,” which is their typical excuse. They are being misleading. They are trading on our collective COVID-19 PTSD to keep us glued to our screens, distracting us from the very real, very human crises happening in our societies. Ironically, also fueled by the politically biased media outlets.

To spare you the headache, we have also checked social media platforms and, as you might expect, they are rife with resurfaced “predictions” and conspiracy theories, distracting a weary public from the complex realities of the systemic issues currently unfolding.

The disconnect is truly stark. On one side, we have a virus that requires you to practically live with an infected rodent or share a cruise cabin with a symptomatic patient to catch it. On the other hand, we have a media apparatus that would rather stoke the embers of pandemic trauma that we all lived through during COVID.

Let me put it as simply as I can. This hantavirus “scare” is a distraction we can absolutely afford to ignore. This is why I continuously, and unapologetically, ask you to support our independent media and our anti-clickbait approach to reporting that is designed to get us out of this noise and stay focused on what matters.

Join us now and help us create a noise-free knowledge space.