The Ministry of Health has confirmed a second positive hantavirus case linked to the outbreak detected earlier this month aboard the luxury cruise ship MV Hondius.

The new case was identified during routine diagnostic testing carried out on passengers and contacts currently being held in preventive quarantine at Madrid’s Hospital Central de la Defensa Gomez Ulla.

According to the ministry, the infected individual was already being monitored as a ‘close contact’ following epidemiological tracing launched after the outbreak aboard the Dutch vessel.

As with the first confirmed case, the patient has now been transferred to the hospital’s High-Level Isolation Unit, where they will remain under specialist medical supervision and strict biosecurity protocols.

Health officials stressed that the patient is currently asymptomatic.

Authorities also insisted the new positive result does not increase the risk to the general public or alter the epidemiological response already in place.

The Gomez Ulla isolation unit was originally built after Spain’s Ebola crisis in 2014 and includes advanced containment systems such as negative pressure rooms, controlled access circuits and specialised decontamination procedures.

The latest case is the second infection detected among the close contacts being monitored since the health alert was activated.

Those quarantined at the military hospital have remained isolated since May 10 under a 43-day monitoring protocol.

Initial plans had allowed some of the confined individuals to potentially complete the final 14 days of quarantine at home if they continued testing negative.

However, the newly confirmed infection means the affected individual will now remain isolated for longer.

Despite the positive result, Health Ministry sources cited by 20Minutos said the remaining 12 quarantined contacts will not be affected because they have spent the past two weeks isolated under strict safety measures.

Under the updated protocol, anyone still testing negative after 28 days in hospital isolation – currently scheduled for June 7 – may then complete the remainder of their quarantine period at home.

Hantavirus is a rare virus typically transmitted to humans through contact with infected rodents or their droppings. Depending on the strain, it can cause severe respiratory or kidney complications in some patients.