{"id":166,"date":"2026-05-12T12:33:59","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T12:33:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/coloradorelocationreport.com\/?p=166"},"modified":"2026-05-12T12:33:59","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T12:33:59","slug":"its-hantavirus-season-in-colorado-heres-why-thats-not-as-scary-as-the-cruise-ship-outbreak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/coloradorelocationreport.com\/?p=166","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s hantavirus season in Colorado. Here\u2019s why that\u2019s not as scary as the cruise ship outbreak."},"content":{"rendered":"
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As U.S. citizens aboard a hantavirus-stricken cruise ship make their way to special containment units in Nebraska and Georgia for quarantine, Colorado health officials say they are not expecting anyone connected to the ship outbreak to arrive here.<\/p>

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\u201cColorado is not impacted by the hantavirus outbreak at this time,\u201d Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment spokesperson Hope Shuler wrote in an email.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a comfort amid a major global public health spectacle. (To wit: The British military on Saturday air-dropped medical personnel into one of the most remote settlements on Earth after a resident there tested positive for the virus following a visit by the cruise ship, MV Hondius.)<\/p>\n

But Colorado also typically sees a smattering of homegrown hantavirus cases per year, and spring and summer are peak times for the disease in our state.<\/p>\n

Given that the outbreak on the cruise ship is believed to have been spread person-to-person, it might raise a question: Could Colorado one day see a major human-spread outbreak of hantavirus?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unlikely, at least from the virus that is endemic here.<\/p>\n

Hantavirus is not a single virus but rather a whole family of viruses. As Shuler explained, Colorado has the Sin Nombre version of hantavirus, which has never been documented to travel person-to-person.<\/p>\n

The Andes version of the virus, which occurs in South America and is what\u2019s suspected on the ship, can spread person-to-person, though it is not believed to spread easily that way. In Colorado, the virus is spread primarily through contact with rodent droppings or urine.<\/p>\n

While hantavirus infections of any type are rare in the United States, Colorado tends to be a hot spot.<\/p>

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The state was among those affected by a Four Corners-region cluster in 1993 that was caused by an explosion in the deer mouse population following an El Ni\u00f1o winter and a boom in spring vegetation.<\/p>\n

Since 1993, Colorado has seen the second-most cases of hantavirus, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There have been 37 known cases since 2016, according to CDPHE, and nine of those who were infected died.<\/p>\n

In part because of that 1993 cluster, hantavirus is often thought of as a Southwest-y desert disease. But the risk is actually quite spread out in Colorado, as a map of cases shows.<\/p>\n