North Korea Flags Hantavirus Danger Amid Cruise Ship Outbreak

(MENAFN- IANS) Seoul, May 11 (IANS) North Korea has raised the alarm over the danger posed by the Hantavirus after an outbreak on a foreign cruise ship has killed three passengers, echoing its response to the COVID-19 pandemic years earlier.

The Rodong Simnum, the ruling Workers' Party's official newspaper, reported Monday on the outbreak of the Andes strain of the virus on a ship sailing in the Atlantic Ocean, describing it as "raising concerns from the international community."

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention has issued a Level 3 emergency response over the outbreak, activating its emergency operations center, it added.

The paper urged the public to minimize contact with infected rodents, maintain cleanliness at home and in the workplace, and practice good personal hygiene to reduce the risk of infection.

The report followed an earlier dispatch Friday, when it covered the first fatality aboard the MV Hondius, which had departed from Argentina.

The coverage appears intended to alert the public to the potential risk of the virus reaching the country. It echoed Pyongyang's response to COVID-19, when it sealed its borders for years to halt the spread of the virus, Yonhap news agency reported.

At that time, the shutdown effectively halted economic exchanges with its key trading partners, China and Russia, and is believed to have caused significant economic damage.

Meanwhile, the Embassy of India in Madrid, Spain, stated on Sunday that two Indians who were aboard the Hantavirus-hit cruise ship are safe and asymptomatic.

The Dutch-flagged vessel MV Hondius, with around 150 individuals, including two Indian nationals, arrived in Spain on Sunday.

In the context of the Hantavirus outbreak, the ship anchored off the coast of the Canary Islands of Spain. The passengers onboard disembarked from the ship in accordance with the protocol established by the WHO and the Spanish authorities, stated the Embassy.

The two Indian nationals are healthy and asymptomatic. As informed by the Spanish National Centre for Emergency Monitoring and Coordination (CENEM), the two Indian nationals who were travelling as crew members have been evacuated to the Netherlands, where they will be quarantined as per relevant health safety protocol, the embassy noted.

The Embassy also highlighted that the Ambassador is in close contact with the Spanish authorities and the two Indian nationals (crew members) and is regularly monitoring the situation to ensure the well-being and safety of the Indian nationals.

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