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Three Utahns are among the 18 U.S. passengers who were moved from a cruise ship where people were exposed to the Andes hantavirus, the state’s health department said.

Most of the Americans were moved Sunday to a quarantine center in Omaha, Nebraska, The New York Times reported. One of them tested “mildly” positive for the virus and was put in a more restrictive containment unit, The Times said. Two more passengers, a couple, were sent to a hospital in Atlanta; one of those people had mild symptoms, the newspaper reported.

The passengers, because they are isolated, present minimal risk of spreading the virus to the public, the Utah Department of Health and Human Services said Monday.

The department’s executive director, Tracy Gruber, said in a statement that the agency is “coordinating closely with our local health departments, the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], and the passengers to take the necessary steps to prevent risk to others.”

Utah officials learned Friday that one of the passengers was from the Beehive State and later confirmed that three are Utahns. The health department said all the U.S. passengers will be allowed to return to their home states only when it’s safe to do so. Even then, the passengers will be monitored for symptoms for six weeks and isolated if they show symptoms.

Dr. Leisha Nolen, the state’s epidemiologist, said in a statement that “I am concerned about the individuals exposed to this virus on the cruise ship, but I don’t have concerns about an infection spreading widely. … While we learn more about the Andes strain and how it is transmitted, we understand how to stop it from spreading.”

The cruise ship, the MV Hondius, left Argentina on April 1 for the Canary Islands, with 150 passengers on board, The Times reported. Health officials said three passengers died from hantavirus and several others became ill or tested positive.

Hantavirus strains are usually spread through contact with wild rodent droppings or urine, the Utah’s health department said. The Andes strain, the one found on the ship, can spread from person to person in limited circumstances, but usually when someone is in close contact with someone who is actively sick with the disease.

The virus is not known to spread through casual contact, like shaking hands or being in the same room with an infected person, the department said, and there have been no documented cases in which a person without symptoms spread the virus to another person.

Passengers disembarked over the weekend from the Hondius in Tenerife, in the Canary Islands. The ship left port there Monday, headed to Rotterdam, the Netherlands, where the vessel will be disinfected, The Times reported.