World War II bomb removed from airport in Japan

Up to 2,241 new cases of COVID-19 have been reported across the globe as of Thursday, bringing the total count to 95,333, according to the latest official data by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Five countries, territories and areas reported COVID-19 cases for the first time in the past 24 hours, the Xinhua news agency reported.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus emphasised the importance of implementing a comprehensive approach to mitigate the impact of the virus in a briefing on Wednesday.

New Delhi, Mar 24: Reports of a person in China dying due to a virus called hantavirus have spread panic at a time when the world is battling the pandemic of novel coronavirus, which began in China.

The novel coronavirus has killed over 16,000 people around the world and the outbreak is yet to be brought under control.

This morning, hantavirus became one of the top trends on Twitter after the Chinese state media tweeted about one person in the country dying due the virus. However, it turns out, hantavirus is not a new virus and has been infecting humans for decades.

Global Times, a state-run English-language newspaper, wrote on Twitter on Tuesday, "A person from Yunnan Province died while on his way back to Shandong Province for work on a chartered bus on Monday. He was tested positive for hantavirus. Other 32 people on bus were tested."

Global Times's hantavirus report on Twitter has been shared over 6,000 times.

On Tuesday, hantavirus was one of the top trends on Twitter.

WHAT IS HANTAVIRUS?

Some people are calling it a new virus but so is not the case. United States's National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) in a journal writes that currently, the hantavirus genus includes more than 21 species.

"Hantaviruses in the Americas are known as 'New World' hantaviruses and may cause hantavirus pulmonary syndrome [HPS]," CDC says. "Other hantaviruses, known as 'Old World' hantaviruses, are found mostly in Europe and Asia and may cause hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome [HFRS]."

Any man, woman, or child who is around mice or rats that carry harmful hantaviruses can get HPS.

People get HPS when they breath in hantaviruses. This can happen when rodent urine and droppings that contain a hantavirus are stirred up into the air. People can also become infected when they touch mouse or rat urine, droppings, or nesting materials that contain the virus and then touch their eyes, nose, or mouth. They can also get HPS from a mouse or rat bite.

In the US, 10 confirmed cases of hantavirus infection in people who visited Yosemite National Park in California, US, in November 2012, were reported. Similarly, in 2017, CDC assisted health officials in investigating an outbreak of Seoul virus infection that infected 17 people in seven states.

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF HANTAVIRUS?

If people get HPS, they will feel sick one to five weeks after they were around mice or rats that carried a hantavirus.

At first people with HPS will have:

Fever
Severe muscle aches
Fatigue

After a few days, they will have a hard time breathing. Sometimes people will have headaches, dizziness, chills, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, and stomach pain.

Usually, people do not have a runny nose, sore throat, or a rash.

Stockholm, Jun 15: Nuclear powers continue to modernise their arsenals, researchers said Monday, warning that tensions were rising and the outlook for arms control was "bleak".

"The loss of key channels of communication between Russia and the USA... could potentially lead to a new nuclear arms race," said Shannon Kile, director of the nuclear arms control programme at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) and co-author of the report.

Russia and the US account for more than 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons.

Kile was referring to the future of the New START treaty between the US and Russia, which is set to expire in February 2021.

It is the final nuclear deal still in force between the two superpowers, aimed at maintaining their nuclear arsenals below Cold War levels.

"Discussions to extend New START or to negotiate a new treaty made no progress in 2019," the SIPRI researchers noted.

At the same time, nuclear powers continue to modernise their weapons while China and India are increasing the size of their arsenals.

"China is in the middle of a significant modernisation of its nuclear arsenal. It is developing a so-called nuclear triad for the first time, made up of new land- and sea-based missiles and nuclear-capable aircraft," SIPRI said.

The country has repeatedly rejected Washington's insistence that it join any future nuclear arms reduction talks.

The number of nuclear warheads declined in the past year.

At the start of 2020, the United States, Russia, Britain, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea together had 13,400 nuclear arms, according to SIPRI's estimates, 465 fewer than at the start of 2019.

The decline was attributed mainly to the United States and Russia.

While the future of the New START treaty remains uncertain, Washington and Moscow have continued to respect their obligations under the accord.

"In 2019, the forces of both countries remained below the limits specified by the treaty," the report said. But both nations "have extensive and expensive programmes underway to replace and modernise their nuclear warheads, missile and aircraft delivery systems, and nuclear weapon production facilities," it added.

"Both countries have also given new or expanded roles to nuclear weapons in their military plans and doctrines, which marks a significant reversal of the post-Cold War trend towards the gradual marginalisation of nuclear weapons."

The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), a cornerstone of the global nuclear non-proliferation regime, celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.

The number of nuclear arms worldwide has declined since hitting a peak of almost 70,000 in the mid-1980s.

The five original nuclear powers -- Washington, Beijing, Moscow, Paris and London -- in March reiterated their commitment to the treaty.