Special Precautions for Homes of Persons with Confirmed Hantavirus Infection or Buildings with Heavy Rodent Infestations

Special precautions should be used for cleaning homes or buildings with heavy rodent infestations in areas where HPS has been reported. If you are attempting to deal with such an infestation, it is recommended that you contact the responsible local, state, or federal public health agency for guidance.

The special precautions may also apply to vacant dwellings that have attracted numbers of rodents while unoccupied and to dwellings and other structures that have been occupied by persons with confirmed hantavirus infection.

Workers who are either hired specifically to perform the clean-up or asked to do so as part of their work activities should receive a thorough orientation from the responsible health agency about hantavirus transmission and should be trained to perform the required activities safely.

Precautions To Be Used:.

• Persons involved in the clean-up should wear coveralls (disposable, if possible), rubber boots or disposable shoe covers, rubber or plastic gloves, protective goggles, and an appropriate respiratory protection device, such as a half-mask air-purifying (or negative-pressure) respirator with a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter or a powered air-purifying respirator (PAPR) with HEPA filters. 

  Note  The HEPA classification recently has been discontinued.  Please read "Update On the Nomenclature and Use of Respirators as a Precaution for Hantavirus Infection, February, 1999" for details.

• Personal protective gear should be decontaminated upon removal at the end of the day. If the coveralls are not disposable, they should be laundered on site. If no laundry facilities are available, the coveralls should be immersed in liquid disinfectant until they can be washed.
• All potentially infective waste material (including respirator filters) from clean-up operations that cannot be burned or deep buried on site should be double bagged in appropriate plastic bags. The bagged material should then be labeled as infectious (if it is to be transported) and disposed of in accordance with local requirements for infectious waste.
• Workers who develop symptoms suggestive of HPS within 45 days of the last potential exposure should immediately seek medical attention. The physician should contact local health authorities promptly if hantavirus-associated illness is suspected. A blood sample should be obtained and forwarded through the state health department to CDC for hantavirus antibody testing.

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This page last reviewed Thursday, June 10, 2004

Special Pathogens Branch
Division of Viral andThursday, July 8, 2004br> Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services