Infectious Diseases Expert Speaks Out After MAGA Makes Predictably Unfounded Claim About Hantavirus

For those unaware, ivermectin is an FDA-approved antiparasitic medication used to treat conditions caused by parasitic worms as well as external parasites like lice.

Parasites are organisms that depend on a host to both survive and spread. There are three main types of parasites that call humans home—the endoparasites protozoa and helminths (worms), which cause infection inside the body, and ectoparasites, which cause infection superficially within or on the skin.

Viruses are not parasites and ivermectin is not an antiviral medication.

Neither the manufacturer of ivermectin, nor any reputable medical, immunological, or other scientific organization supports the use of ivermectin for anything but the treatment of parasitic infections.

But the "did their own research" crowd that fell for Q-Anon and other conspiracy theories are confused because some in vitro (outside a living organism) laboratory studies in 2020, using extremely high concentrations of ivermectin, showed promise in blocking RNA virus replication, but the research has never been able to replicate results into effective in vivo (inside any living creature) viral treatments. Experiments were conducted again in 2025 on the Zika virus, but were again only effective in vitro.

In other words, overdosing RNA viruses in a petri dish with ivermectin sometimes stopped virus replication, but it hasn't yet been an effective treatment in even rats and mice, let alone humans.

Yet MAGA minions, and many of their leaders, keep touting ivermectin as a cure-all for any number of viral, bacterial, or even genetic and congenital ailments.

Ivermectin first gained widespread notice during the COVID-19 pandemic when health "experts" like Joe Rogan, Fox News' Laura Ingraham and Rachel Campos-Duffy, Wisconsin MAGA Republican Senator Ron Johnson, Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul, former Georgia Q-Anon/MAGA GOP Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, and MAGA Republican President Donald Trump recommended its use.

COVID is an acronym for Corona Virus Disease, and ivermectin is not an antiviral medication. Multiple studies showed how ineffective the drug was against COVID-19, but MAGA continues to cling to their misinformation.

Now MAGA influencers and quackery-practicing grifters are citing their favorite miracle drug as a cure during a deadly hantavirus outbreak on the Dutch cruise ship MV Hondius.

Heightened concern is valid because hantavirus has a high fatality rate, often causing severe respiratory or kidney failure. There is no approved antiviral treatment for hantavirus pulmonary or cardiopulmonary syndrome, so treatment focuses on supportive care while the virus runs its course.

North American strains of hantavirus, like Sin Nombre, have a 25%–40% fatality rate while the South American Andes strains have reached rates up to 50%. Other strains common in Europe and Asia have lower fatality rates, but can cause Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome.

Hantavirus is usually spread by mice and rats to humans through air contaminated by microparticals of their waste, with the virus thriving in enclosed, poorly-ventilated or air recirculating environments.

But the rare Andes strain has proven that close contact can lead to human-to-human transmission, similar to how influenza and COVID are spread. And it is the Andes strain aboard the MV Hondius.

Like COVID, hantavirus has the word "virus" right there in the name and ivermectin is not an antiviral medication.

But many of the same cast of characters who recommended ivermectin for COVID-19 are recommending it now for hantavirus, spreading quack medicine, quack doctors, and pseudoscience misinformation online.

@JimmyFalk_55/X

It's not difficult to see why some discredited anti-vaxxer MDs love to push ivermectin as a cure-all, though.

@ManSwac/X

Many fortunes were made off the ignorant and gullible.

Clinician and infectious diseases expert Dr. Neil Stone expected the snake oil peddlers would crawl back out from under their rocks as soon as news of the hantavirus outbreak made it to mainstream media—and the grifters didn't disappoint.

Dr. Stone called them out on social media for sowing mistrust for profit.

Luckily, only a willfully ignorant audience is still falling for the ivermectin misinformation money grab.

@DrNice2026/X

@Vexx1969/X

@jakecobb/X

@NursePatsy16801/X

While the desire to let evolution take its course may be strong, critical care physician, public health researcher, and assistant professor at Harvard Medical School Dr. Adam Gaffney told Newsweek:

"The danger here is that patients believe these charlatans and do not get proper care—as we saw during the COVID-19 pandemic, when an untold number of Americans were led to believe ivermectin was a superior alternative to vaccination, undoubtedly causing many unnecessary deaths."

As of this writing, there is no widespread hantavirus outbreak beyond the cruise ship the MV Hondius where eight people are believed to have contracted the virus—five confirmed cases and three suspected—with three deaths reported as of the morning of Thursday, May 7.

Solely as a precaution, cruise ship passengers are being monitored across the globe and passengers that disembarked from the MV Hondius early are also being evaluated by health officials.

The ship, still carrying around 147–150 passengers and crew, has been directed to the Spanish territory of Tenerife, Canary Islands, after being barred from docking in Cape Verde.

Ill individuals were evacuated to receive more advanced medical care.