TENERIFE/MADRID (REUTERS)
Countries prepared to evacuate their citizens from the luxury cruise ship hit by a deadly strain of hantavirus that is due to anchor near Tenerife early on Sunday, as health authorities said the risk of the virus spreading was low.
The World Health Organisation briefed member states with nationals on board on Saturday on how to manage the process, advising active monitoring of passengers for a 42-day period from the last point of exposure.
"I need you to hear me clearly: this is not another COVID. The current public health risk from hantavirus remains low,” World Health Organisation chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, wrote in a letter to the public published on X earlier on Saturday.
"Passengers will be ferried ashore at the industrial port of Granadilla, far from residential areas, in sealed, guarded vehicles, through a completely cordoned-off corridor, and repatriated directly to their home countries. You will not encounter them," he added.
Local authorities have said the evacuation must take place between Sunday midday local time (1100 GMT) and around the same time Monday, before conditions at sea are expected to become stormier for the rest of the month.
Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, and the Netherlands will send planes to evacuate their citizens aboard the Tenerife-bound cruise ship, Spain's interior minister said in Madrid on Saturday.
The European Union is sending two further planes for the remaining European citizens, Fernando Grande-Marlaska added.
The US and UK have confirmed that planes and contingency plans were being arranged for non-EU citizens whose countries were unable to send air transport, he said.
British passengers and staff on the cruise ship will be taken to a hospital in northwest England for an initial isolation period once they are repatriated, UK health authorities said on Saturday.
Americans will be sent to Nebraska for quarantine and testing, travel blogger Jake Rosmarin, who is on board the ship, posted on social media.
All passengers, as well as 17 crew members, will be evacuated, but 30 crew members will stay on board and travel on to the Netherlands, Spain's Health Minister Monica Garcia said.
Luggage and the body of a deceased passenger on the ship will remain on board, and the ship will be fully disinfected on arrival, she added.
Spanish citizens will disembark first, with the order of evacuation of the remaining groups of citizens to be determined by health authorities.
Citizens will not be able to disembark until their evacuation plane is ready to depart.