French President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday that the situation regarding hantavirus was "under control" in France, and called for a strong European coordination in an effort to contain the virus.
"The government has made the right decisions. The situation is under control under its authority, thanks to our healthcare workers," Macron said during a press conference in Nairobi at the close of the Africa Forward summit.
Paris—along with Madrid and a few other countries—had put in place "one of the most stringent protocols," based on recommendations of experts and past experience, the French head of state claimed.
"Now, it is important to have genuine European coordination, meaning that protocols should move towards the most demanding standards that have been defined in the very short term, and that the World Health Organisation should be able to coordinate all this properly in the next stages," he added.
Speaking to the National Assembly on Tuesday, France's Health Minister Stéphanie Rist said there was "no evidence" of the widespread circulation of the Andes strain of the hantavirus on national territory, and that officials were relatively certain that the virus had not mutated.
All positive cases identified have so far exclusively been cruise passengers, Rist added.
In France, all 22 contact cases have been contacted, tested, hospitalised or are "in the process" of being hospitalised, according to the government.
A French woman infected in the deadly hantavirus outbreak on the cruise ship, however, remains critically ill and is being treated in Paris with an artifical lung.
The woman has a severe form of the disease that caused life-threatening lung and heart problems, said Dr. Xavier Lescure, an infectious disease specialist at Bichat Hospital.
The patient is on a life-support device that pumps blood through an artificial lung, providing it with oxygen and returning it to the body, Lescure added.
'A neglected tropical disease'
"The situation is quite unusual and unprecedented", epidemiologist Antoine Flahault observed, "which is why health authorities are taking very strong measures" in the face of the uncertainty surrounding the virus.
In the past, some viruses have spread from very remote places where there is limited health surveillance infrastructure, rather than from a "ship carrying147 people",where authorities can identify positive cases and trace contacts effectively.
The epidemiologist characterised the vius as a “neglected tropical disease.”
