Medics of the British Army have parachuted onto the remote Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha to help a British national with suspected hantavirus.
The man left MV Hondius, the cruise ship hit by a deadly outbreak of the virus, in mid-April at Britain’s most remote inhabited overseas territory, where he lives.
He first reported symptoms two weeks after leaving the vessel and is said be in a stable condition while isolating. Six cases of the virus have now been confirmed, including of two other Britons currently being treated off the ship.
Oxygen was also dropped from an RAF A400M on Saturday, with supplies at a “critical level” on the island, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said.
Almost a month after the first death onboard the MV Hondius, the vessel has now arrived in Tenerife, where authorities are helping more than 100 people disembark to be repatriated.
Three people have died in the outbreak, including two who were confirmed to have had hantavirus.
Hantavirus is a group of viruses carried by rodents. Most hantaviruses do not pass from person to person, but the Andes strain, identified in a number of people who had been on the Dutch cruise ship, does.
The British man who lives on Tristan da Cunha disembarked on 14 April, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.
He reported having diarrhoea on 28 April and fever two days later. He is currently in a stable condition and is in isolation.
A team of six paratroopers and two medical clinicians from 16 Air Assault Brigade parachuted on to Tristan da Cunha – an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean considered to be among the world’s most remote islands – having flown from RAF Brize Norton.
Two of the paratroopers jumped in tandem with an intensive care nurse and intensive care doctor, who will provide help to the island, which usually has a two-person medical team.
This is the first time the UK military has parachuted in medical personnel to provide humanitarian support, according to the MoD.
