Ryan Havelka left behind a wife and three daughters. Now his widow wants the North Dakota Department of Health to publicly discuss her husband's death from hantavirus to raise awareness of the illness.
The department reported Wednesday that Ryan Havelka, 29, of Hettinger, died Aug. 5 after a brief battle with hantavirus. Havelka left behind three daughters, ages 4, 2, and 1.
The state health department normally doesn't release the names of those affected by illness, but Havelka's widow, Patty, asked the department to discuss her husband's case in order to raise public awareness of hantavirus.
"Never in a million years did I think my husband would die young, and never did I think it would be from an illness like hantavirus," Patty Havelka said.
"I think he would definitely want to help (others). It would break his heart to see this happening to anybody else," she added.
Kirby Krueger, state epidemiologist for the health department, said Havelka's case of hantavirus is the 10th case reported and the sixth death in North Dakota since the virus was discovered in the northwestern United States in 1993. Hantavirus is contracted through contact with rodents and rodent-infested buildings, and people usually get hantavirus by inhaling the virus found in the saliva, urine and droppings of rodents.
Hanavirus infections in people result in serious respiratory illness with a high death rate. There is no cure for the disease.
Patty Havelka said her husband's symptoms began six days before his death. On July 30, he felt ill and had a headache, and the feeling continued. In the next two days, he started to get chills and sweats, as though he were running a fever.
"It just seemed like a regular viral illness. On Saturday, Aug. 2, we had gone to a clinic, and it seemed to be a viral infection," Patty Havelka said.
On Sunday, he started to feel like he had a wheeze in his chest, and he was admitted to the hospital. His condition continued to deteriorate rapidly over the next 18 hours.
"He had to be on a ventilator. His lungs filled up with fluid, his kidneys failed... it just quickly overtook him," Patty Havelka said.
The health department has investigated the cause of Ryan Havelka's case of hantavirus, and has found several possibilities. He had been participating in a lot of outdoor activity and had been working in outbuildings that were likely rodent infested.
Since early symptoms can be vague, it's important to let a physician know if you've had a recent history of exposure to rodents to tip the physician off that hantavirus might be a cause, Krueger said.
Keeping mice out of homes and buildings is important in the fight against the disease, as is properly cleaning up areas that have been contaminated with rodent urine, droppings, and nests. Krueger recommended that individuals open doors and windows to air out a building that has been closed up before they clean it.
While cleaning, Krueger said, individuals should wear gloves and should not vacuum or sweep contaminated floors, which causes the virus to become airborne. Instead, they should wet the contaminated surface with a bleach solution or a household disinfectant approved by the Environmental Protection Agency, and then they should use a paper towel to remove the droppings or other contaminated materials. After cleaning, individuals should disinfect the gloves they were wearing and wash their hands with soap and water after removing the gloves.
The form of hantavirus found in the state is carried by the deer mouse.
"It's difficult for most people to distinguish between different species of small rodents in North Dakota. We encourage people to view and treat every small rodent as a potential carrier of hantavirus," Krueger said.
