the woman…had been suffering flu-like symptoms but they appeared to be getting better and she did not have a fever.

“They were not thinking that these symptoms were compatible with hantavirus. Why? Because what she was telling [them] was [that she had] an episode of coughing some days ago that had disappeared, and what she was having at that moment was kind of like stress or anxiety or nervousness. So it was not catalogued [as hantavirus],” Padilla said.

“It is not that the patient was feeling bad and she was saying: ‘OK, I’m not going to say anything because I want to be on the plane.’ It was like: ‘OK, we have measured your temperature, it was not fever, afterwards you have been on the plane, it has taken off, you have started feeling bad, we have measured your temperature and it was fever.’”

Padilla said passengers could not have been tested onboard the vessel because there were no rapid PCR tests for hantavirus available. Any testing would have involved flying samples to Madrid to a specialist lab

She had no fever, she mentioned a brief cough that was gone, and then described feelings of anxiety. There were no tests that could be done there that would be definitive, so they cleared based on other factors. She didnt present any significant symptoms until she was on the flight.