Friday, May 15, 2026
Thursday, May 14, 2026
More Americans Being Monitored for Hantavirus Than Previously Known
The number of Americans being monitored after potential hantavirus exposure has climbed to 41, but there are no current U.S. cases, the CDC said on Thursday.
That tally is up from earlier reviews of state health department data, which showed that at least 36 people in 11 states were under monitoring for potential exposures in connection with the cruise ship outbreak linked to 11 cases and three deaths worldwide.
David Fitter, MD, the CDC's incident manager for the hantavirus response, defended the agency's response to the outbreak in a media briefing on Thursday and emphasized that the CDC is working closely with health authorities here and abroad.
"We understand how to respond to [hantavirus] and remain vigilant," he said. "We're working very closely with all the state and local health departments to monitor everybody, all the contacts that are coming back again."
Fitter noted that the current risk to the general public is low. Testing for hantavirus is recommended only for people with symptoms, and ongoing testing decisions by health authorities "are guided by the best available evidence."
The 41 people currently undergoing the 42-day symptom-monitoring period includes three main groups:
- Passengers from the cruise ship who've returned to the U.S. and are undergoing monitoring at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha or Emory University in Atlanta
- Passengers who left the ship and returned home before the outbreak was identified
- People who were potentially exposed during travel on flights with ship passengers who disembarked before the ship reached the Canary Islands
"We want to ensure that a good plan is in place for the passengers and for the jurisdictions to ensure everyone remains safe and healthy, and that all communities also remain safe and healthy," Fitter said.
The CDC has been criticized for its slow response to the outbreak. It wasn't an agency announcement that brought news of the American passengers who returned home from the cruise ship after the first fatality -- but before the outbreak was identified -- but rather MedPage Today's own reporting on May 6. The agency 2 days later issued a health advisory that urged clinicians to be aware of the potential for imported hantavirus cases connected with the cruise ship outbreak.
The CDC has 100 staff members as part of their response but isn't using its federal quarantining authority on any passengers or potential contacts, Fitter said, choosing instead to work "closely with passengers and public health partners to ensure monitoring and rapid access to care if symptoms develop."
Interim guidance for monitoring and managing potential exposures from the agency stratifies contacts into high- and low-risk categories. High-risk contacts who were aboard the cruise ship should choose home- or facility-based management with isolation and travel restrictions. Low-risk contacts who had limited exposure to symptomatic people should self-monitor for symptoms for 42 days, but there are no recommended travel or activity restrictions.
While appropriate monitoring can happen in home-based settings, Fitter noted, the CDC has encouraged the 16 people being monitored at the University of Nebraska Medical Center to remain at the center. If hantavirus symptoms develop, he added, the CDC can turn around testing in 24 hours.
Fitter deferred questions about current test results among the 41 people under monitoring to state and local authorities, in addition to questions about whether states had agreed with the CDC's recommendation that some high-risk people could move from facility- to home-based management.
The number of people being monitored could rise if health authorities broaden their search for exposed individuals' contacts. "We're ... monitoring all Americans who potentially would have been exposed, whether in the U.S. or abroad, and we have been in contact with them," Fitter explained.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/generalinfectiousdisease/121278
Aveanna ups guidance
Aveanna Healthcare posts Q1 EPS $0.18, revenue $647.9M (+15.9% YoY), raises 2026 revenue to $2.56–$2.58B and adjusted EBITDA to $328–$332M
Non-GAAP EPS $0.18 increased 80% year over year, beating Q1 analyst estimates.
KUDLOW: Xi’s saber-rattling is no match for America’s Trumpian economic boom
According to reports, President Xi Jinping did a little saber-rattling over the Republic of China on Taiwan with President Trump. More or less, he seemed to be saying if America doesn’t handle Taiwan properly, the two countries will clash — and put the relationship in great jeopardy.
No one really knows what that means, forever and ever we’ve had a policy of strategic ambiguity, which amounts to an American defense of Taiwan’s autonomy and independence. I don’t think any of that is going to change. Nor do I think Mr. Trump wants it to change; it’s not really negotiable. And Taiwan, and especially the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or TSMC, may well be at the center of the world’s A.I. competition. That’s a Taiwanese company that has just opened a substantial operation at Phoenix, Arizona. As well as other places in America. I doubt very strongly that Mr. Trump wants any of that changed. Or worse, give it up. Mr. Xi is bluffing.
In recent weeks he has watched America end his influence in Venezuela, the Panama Canal, soon it will be Cuba, and of course Iran. I mean Communist China’s buying 90 percent of Iran’s oil and gas exports. But with Mr. Trump’s air-tight blockade of Iranian ports, China is starving for energy. They might make a deal with us, but that too remains to be seen if it comes under Treasury Man Scott Bessent’s investment board idea.
Meanwhile Mr. Trump has elbowed China out of the Middle East and out of the Western Hemisphere. And on top of all that, China’s economy has never recovered from the real estate property crash of a couple years ago. They used to post GDP growth rates of 15 percent or more. Now that’s down to 5 percent or even less, which is essentially for them a recession. And if they have bad economic statistics cropping up, they have decided not to publish them at all.
Remember, China is Communist China, the CCP. Way back in the 1980s and 1990s, they flirted with some free market reforms that actually improved their economy, and generated a functioning private sector. Yet in the 21st century under subsequent dictators, most notably Mr. Xi, the economy has been turned back into a tightly-run statist enterprise, with enormous corruption and repeated economic failure.
In world trade, they are highly protectionist and rarely keep their promises to open up markets. As someone who worked on Mr. Trump’s first term Phase One trade deal, I can tell you a lot about their broken promises. My point here is that while China has invested substantially in a strong military, their economy is malfunctioning and their political standing in the world is slipping badly.
All this reminds me of President Reagan and Gorbachev. The American economy was booming in the Reagan 1980s. The Soviet economy was collapsing. Gorbachev desperately wanted Reagan to drop what was then known as Star Wars, which has now become the Golden Dome defense of America. And of course Mr. Trump’s Space Force. Anyway, Reagan refused to negotiate Star Wars away. He bluntly told Gorbachev that the strong American economy was producing the resources to support space defense, but that the Soviet economy couldn’t possibly match us.
I think the same is true today with Messrs. Trump and Xi. Here’s my favorite statistic: on a per capita basis, American GDP is well over $90,000 per person. And China? On a per person basis their GDP is just shy of $14,000. That gives America a nearly seven-fold economic advantage over China. So Mr. Xi may saber-rattle all he wants, but Mr. Trump has the goods to keep America first.