Health experts assess the risk of a hantavirus outbreak in Asia as minimal, despite two Singapore residents being isolated after contracting the virus on a cruise ship. Human transmission of hantavirus is rare.

The risk of a hantavirus outbreak in Asia remains minimal, according to health experts, despite the return of two Singapore residents who were on board a cruise ship where three people died from the disease that triggered a regional panic. Hantaviruses are a family of rat-carried viruses that can infect humans through direct exposure, even though transmission between people is extremely rare. The disease takes its name from South Korea’s Hantan River, where an early strain was identified after.....