Health watch | The Hantavirus scare: Beware of the rodents

What began as a mysterious illness aboard an Antarctic luxury cruise has now turned into one of the world’s most closely watched infectious disease scares. The hantavirus outbreak, which left several passengers critically ill and caused multiple deaths, has drawn attention not only because the virus is rare, but because the Andes strain involved is one of the few known to show limited human-to-human transmission. Scientists and public-health agencies nevertheless stress that this is not a Covid-scale threat. The overall risk remains low.