Doctor dedicated his life to uncovering, combating pathogen named after Korea’s Hantan River
The late Korean virologist Lee Ho-wang, who identified hantavirus and helped develop the world’s first vaccine against the disease it causes, has returned to public attention after a deadly outbreak linked to a cruise ship off the coast of Spain.
As of Sunday, three people were suspected of having died from the virus. Five others were reportedly infected aboard the Dutch cruise ship MV Hondius, which is currently docked at a port in Tenerife in the Canary Islands. Before the outbreak, the vessel had departed from Argentina after traveling through Antarctica.
Hantavirus strains found in East Asia generally have lower fatality rates than the variants commonly found in the Americas. Although infections also remain relatively limited in South Korea, research efforts to improve vaccines and treatments continue as scientists carry on Lee’s legacy.
According to the National Archives of Korea, Lee successfully isolated the virus from the lungs of a field mouse in 1976 and later developed the world’s first preventive vaccine against the disease, Hantavax, in 1988.
His achievement is considered a rare case in which a single researcher contributed both to identifying the cause of a disease and developing a means of prevention.
The research began as an effort to uncover the cause of what was then known as Korean hemorrhagic fever, which infected more than 3,000 United Nations troops during the 1950-53 Korean War near the current inter-Korean border.
Suspecting rodents were responsible for the outbreak, Lee captured more than 3,000 rats and mice from border regions beginning in the late 1960s. He did so despite difficulties that included contracting the disease himself and being mistaken for a spy while wandering through heavily militarized areas.
Eventually, from a rodent captured near the Hantan River, which runs through northern parts of Gangwon and Gyeonggi provinces, he identified the causative virus, naming it the Hantaan virus, which became known more broadly as hantavirus. In 1980, Lee also identified the Seoulvirus, a subtype of the virus family.
According to Lee’s findings, the disease spreads when humans inhale or ingest virus particles contained in rodent saliva, urine or feces. Building on the discovery, Lee’s team later succeeded in launching a preventive vaccine after testing it on themselves.
With South Korea’s urbanization, hantavirus infections have steadily declined. In 2024, 373 cases were reported nationwide, mostly in rural rice-farming regions that provide habitats for rodents.
While hantavirus refers to a group of related viruses, the strains found in South Korea have a fatality rate of below 5 percent, with annual deaths remaining below 10 in most years.
However, the strain believed to be linked to the recent cruise ship outbreak reportedly carries a fatality rate of up to 40 percent.
Rodents carrying the virus are commonly found in parts of South America, especially near the Andes Mountains. Unlike Asian and European strains that mainly affect the kidneys and blood vessels, the South American variants are known to cause severe heart and lung symptoms.
“The rodents carrying hantavirus strains that cause cardiopulmonary symptoms do not inhabit Korea, and no imported cases have been reported so far, meaning the public health risk remains low,” said Lim Seung-kwan, commissioner of the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency
“If you plan to travel to South American countries such as Argentina or Chile, avoid contact with rodents and refrain from entering enclosed areas that may contain rodent droppings.”
Since Lee’s death, researchers who inherited his work have continued to develop improved vaccines and treatment methods at the laboratory he established.
“Virus infections continue worldwide, and the existing vaccine was developed more than 35 years ago, making it increasingly urgent to improve and modernize it,” said Song Jin-won, a biomedical science professor at Korea University.
Medical experts say no fully proven treatment has yet been developed, partly because securing a stable number of infected patients for clinical trials remains difficult.
While clinical testing generally requires three phases, ranging from initial safety evaluations involving 20 to 80 participants to large-scale efficacy testing involving up to 3,000 participants, only Phase 1 trials have so far been completed by a US research team.
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