In the first three months of 2026, 63 cases of hantavirus infection were registered in Ukraine. The Public Health Center (PHC) reported this in response to a journalist’s request, hromadske reported on May 18.
The Center for Public Health reported that the most cases of hantavirus since the beginning of the year were recorded in the Sumy region – 58. Three more cases were detected in the Chernihiv region and one each in the Kirovograd and Vinnytsia regions.
Last year, 436 cases of hantavirus were registered in Ukraine. Almost all infections then also occurred in the Sumy region – 428 cases, the media writes. Several more infections were recorded in the Lviv, Chernihiv, Kharkov and Cherkasy regions.
In 2024, three cases of hantavirus were detected in Ukraine, and in 2023 – also three. The most infections in recent years have been recorded in Sumy, Lviv and Chernihiv regions.
At the same time, the center emphasized that all cases recorded in Ukraine concern hantavirus strains that are transmitted from rodents to humans. The Andes strain, which can spread between people, has never been recorded on the territory of Ukraine.
Infectious disease doctor from Dnieper Lyudmila Shostakovich-Koretskaya explained in a comment to Suspilny that the Andes strain is the most dangerous.
“If all hantaviruses are transmitted mainly through contact with dust and rodents, then this one, the most aggressive strain that caused the outbreak on the liner, can be transmitted, in particular, by airborne droplets, but only with prolonged and close contact. As for natural strains, they are not transmitted from person to person, but only through contact with rodents and their excrement. With dust: if you clean a room, where these rodents live, you can also become infected,” the doctor noted.
