Soldiers dropped oxygen supplies and medical aid to Britain’s most remote overseas territory

• What is hantavirus?

Paratroopers landed on a “golf course covered in rocks” to supply medical personnel and oxygen to Britain’s most remote overseas territory as it deals with a suspected hantavirus case, an army commander has said.

The UK Health Security Agency confirmed on Friday that a British national had disembarked from the cruise ship MV Hondius to the South Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha, where they live, with a suspected case of hantavirus.

Seventeen passengers to be taken to a Nebraska quarantine center to be assessed, with one testing positive and another showing symptoms

• Explainer: what happens to all the cruise ship passengers now and will they quarantine?

The 17 Americans onboard the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship M/V Hondius – including one person who has tested positive – have disembarked the vessel after it docked in Tenerife on Sunday and are being repatriated to the US.

Upon their arrival in Spain, medical teams from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) awaited and interviewed the passengers, whose identities have not been publicly disclosed and who have not tested positive for the virus, about their exposure on the cruise.

Thirty years after first person-to-person transmission was documented in Patagonia, scientists say global heating could increase world’s exposure

An outbreak in rural communities 30 years ago in the Patagonia area of Argentina led scientists, for the first time, to document person-to-person transmission of hantavirus, which until then had been known only to spread through contact with rodents.

Nearly a decade ago another outbreak, also in Patagonia, provided detailed evidence of inter-human transmission when an infected 68-year-old rural worker attended a birthday party in a small village. The infection spread and resulted in 11 deaths.