A public dispute over the source of a deadly hantavirus outbreak linked to an Antarctic cruise has erupted between regional authorities in Argentina’s southernmost province of Tierra del Fuego and national public health officials, raising questions about the country’s weakened disease monitoring system and threatening the region’s critical tourism economy. The outbreak, which centers on the Andes variant of hantavirus — a rare strain capable of limited person-to-person transmission — was traced by Argentine federal health authorities earlier this week to a landfill outside Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego’s main city and the primary departure gateway for Antarctic cruises. Federal investigators named the site as the most likely location where two Dutch tourists, who later died from the infection, contracted the virus while birdwatching. But regional officials are pushing back fiercely against this conclusion, arguing there is compelling evidence that the infection occurred elsewhere during the couple’s four-month journey across South America, and warning that the false origin claim is causing severe damage to the region’s reputation.
Argentina’s hot spot for Antarctic cruises insists it didn’t cause the hantavirus outbreak
