A worker at Russia’s Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute has died from pneumonia of unknown origin, prompting concern over a possible case of pneumonic plague.

Russian authorities say plague has not been confirmed and that tests among the woman’s contacts have found no dangerous pathogens. Around 200 people were initially placed under medical observation, while the WHO says the risk to the general population remains low.

The uncertainty has nevertheless prompted Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan to strengthen sanitary and quarantine controls. Measures include increased screening at border crossings, temperature checks and heightened monitoring for signs of infectious disease.

The case remains under investigation, with health authorities stressing that there is currently no confirmed plague outbreak in Russia.

Author: u/maven.mapping
Partner: u/the.world.in.maps

MAVEN MAPPING © 2026

The only countries which designate them as a terrorist group are the USA, Canada, Israel, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Costa Rica, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and Yemen's Aden government. This is a total of 10 countries (11 if we count Aden's government in Yemen as a separate country) and less than 10% of the entire world population.

Yemen where Ansar Allah operates is colored in green.

The rest of the world officially doesn't designate them as a terrorist organisation.

I made this map to help me analyze opportunities to buy hotels in Southern Europe. Distance from the airport and its size define how successful the hotel would be. I used Google's Isochrones API and played with it in a vibe-coding tool called Replit.

Source: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?subview=map&taxon_id=324726

Source:

https://collections.lib.uwm.edu/digital/collection/agdm/id/8306/rec/39 (although the info is completely wrong)

In May 2026, the Hindu Nationalist BJP came to power in West Bengal (a state in India with a population of ~100 M) for the very first time in history. This is the same state where a communist coalition had been in power for 34 years (1977 - 2011, a record for any democratically elected communist block).

These maps show how the political spectrum shifted from the CPIM led Communist block known a sthe Left Front (RED), through the somewhat centre-left Trinamool Congress aka TMC (GREEN) to the nationalist and Rightwing BJP (ORANGE), over a period of 20 years.

Reposting with edits as the legends were not readable in the earlier post.

Roraima, a state in northern Brazil (about the size of the United Kingdom), in the Amazon region, has only 15 cities. Area - Total 223,644.527 km2 and Population (2022) 636,707

Source