Hantavirus cases in Argentina have almost doubled over the past year.

Hantavirus cases in Argentina have almost doubled in the past year, with the country recording 32 deaths alongside its highest number of infections since 2018.

The increase comes as Argentine officials rush to track the movements of a couple who traveled widely across the country and later died during a virus outbreak on the cruise ship MV Hondius, which departed from Ushuaia in southern Argentina on April 1 and is now en route to Spain’s Canary Islands.

Experts point to climate change and habitat loss as the reasons behind the increase in cases of the disease, which typically spreads through contact with the urine or droppings of infected rodents.

According to Argentina’s health ministry, the current season, which began in June 2025, has already reported 101 confirmed hantavirus cases, compared to just 57 during the same period last year.

This year, the country not only saw an unusually high number of cases but also one of the highest lethality rates in recent years, with deaths rising by 10 percentage points compared to the previous year.

And those numbers exclude the outbreak on the cruise-ship MV Hondius, the origins of which remain unknown.

While no cases of the hantavirus have been recorded in Ushuaia in recent decades, according to the ministry, the virus is endemic in some other areas of Argentina.

Argentine authorities believe the couple visited various regions of the country as they crossed back and forth over the border with neighboring Chile on several occasions, and into Uruguay, before joining the cruise.

Argentina has four geographic regions that have historically been high-risk for contagion: the Northwest (Salta, Jujuy, and Tucumán), the Northeast (Misiones, Formosa, and Chaco), the Center (Buenos Aires, Santa Fe, and Entre Ríos), and the South (Neuquén, Río Negro, and Chubut).

The Dutch couple who died amid the outbreak on the ship are thought to have visited both Misiones and Neuquén on their travels.