The Health Department says test results for a Western Cape resident who was tested for hantavirus last week have returned negative.

The individual was one of four people from the province who travelled on the same Airlink flight as the Dutch woman who later died in Johannesburg from hantavirus-related complications in late April.

Ten passengers on the flight are from Gauteng, with one displaying symptoms. The test results from this individual are not yet known. There were 82 passengers and 6 crew onboard the Airlink flight in total.

The Dutch woman had disembarked from the MV Hondius at St Helena Island before flying to Johannesburg on 25 April.

Her husband had earlier died on board the cruise ship.

Health authorities believe the couple may have been exposed to rodents carrying the rare Andes strain of hantavirus while birdwatching at a landfill site in Argentina before boarding the vessel.

Officials believe the virus was then brought onto the ship, where several infections were later recorded.

They were identified as 70-year-old Leo Schilperoord, and his wife, the 69-year-old Mirjam Schilperoord. They were avid birdwatchers from Haulerwijk, Netherlands.

A German woman also died on board the ship. A British passenger was evacuated to South Africa from the ship after falling ill and is recovering in a Johannesburg hospital.

Meanwhile, passengers from the MV Hondius were evacuated from Tenerife on Sunday and are being flown home to their respective countries.

Spain, France, Britain, Ireland, Turkey and the United States are among the nations coordinating charter flights and quarantine measures.

Health officials say the risk to the wider public remains low, with passengers expected to self-isolate for up to 42 days after exposure.

The World Health Organisation has stressed that this is not the start of another pandemic, as the hantavirus does not spread as readily as coronaviruses.

Read The Guardian’s latest article, explaining how the tragedy at sea unfolded.