Updated on: May 8, 2026 / 9:55 PM EDT / CBS News

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Twenty-four years ago, Arizona photojournalist Gilbert Zermeño, who contracted hantavirus after losing both his mother and sister to the illness, says news of the recent outbreak has been hard to process.

"I imagine I got the same feeling that every person who's ever contracted hantavirus and still deals with the effects afterwards of it," Zermeño told CBS News' "The Daily Report." "It takes you back, and it's no less painful now than it was back then. It's hard. I'm not going to lie."

In 2002, Zermeño found out he contracted hantavirus after cleaning the family house in Texas following the death of his mother and sister.…