New Yorkers can get hantavirus from rats scurrying around the city — but only if you’re doing something extremely repulsive, an infectious disease expert warned Friday.
“Pizza Rat is not going to give this to you unless you’re eating its poop and licking its urine,” Dr. Ulysses Wu of Hartford Healthcare told The Post.
Asked if filthy furballs running around subways could spread to New Yorkers, he replied, “It’s not happening that way.”
Only folks who ingest rodent waste or inhale particles of it in small enclosed spaces such as attics or closets are at risk of contracting the disease, he said.
The deadly virus has likely already been around the Big Apple for decades and gone under-diagnosed, Wu said.
“It wouldn’t all of a sudden start happening now,” he said. “People just need to be careful when they clean areas where rodents have been.”
Urban living folks, such as New York City residents, are actually less likely to contract the virus because its largely spread by deer mice, which are country-living creatures, said epidemiologist Michael Osterholm.
“That’s why we see cases more like in rural areas,” said Osterholm, a professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health.
He said folks should be careful not to “aerosol” rodent feces when cleaning.
“If you see mouse droppings, don’t sweep them or vacuum — use a wet disposable towel so you don’t get the virus into the air,” said Osterholm.
In total, roughly 900 cases of Hantavirus have been reported in the US since 1993, an average of about 27 cases a year, Wu said.
Roughly 35 to 40% of cases are fatal, and COVID-like symptoms include body aches, a chronic headache and fatigue.
A deadly outbreak of the virus spread this on the MV Hondius cruise ship this week, killing at least three passengers and sickening seven, according to the World Health Organization.
The outbreak likely originated from land-based exposure to rodents in Argentina.
