Pyongyang says China’s dust storms may contain neoconaviruses, China and North Korea just commemorated “anti-American aid to North Korea” with the same tune.

North Korean officials have warned that the dust storms from China may carry the new coronavirus and urged people to stay indoors, leaving the streets of Pyongyang nearly empty. There is no evidence linking the seasonal dust storms to the Musinovirus, but North Korea is not the only country to make the connection.

According to a report cited by the Central News Agency, North Korea has said that the dust storms in China contain the new coronavirus and that outdoor work is strictly prohibited. The report quoted the BBC as saying today that yellow sand from the deserts of China and Mongolia regularly blows into the neighboring Koreas, and that these dust storms, mixed with toxic dust, have posed health hazards to people in the two Koreas for years. The DPRK has warned that these dust storms from China may carry the neo-coronavirus and has urged people to stay indoors, leaving the streets of Pyongyang nearly empty.

According to a post on the Facebook page of the Russian Embassy in Pyongyang, the DPRK’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also issued this warning to other diplomatic or international agencies in North Korea, advising all expatriates to stay indoors and keep their doors and windows closed. The dust storms were also mentioned in a report published yesterday by North Korea’s official media, Labor News: “All workers… should be aware of the danger of the invading virus”.

The BBC’s disinformation team noted that the Republic of Turkmenistan had also previously claimed that they were asking people to wear masks because of the virus-laden dust, denying that they were covering up the epidemic.

According to the Seoul-based NK News, a North Korea watchdog, North Korea’s official media inferred that “caution should be exercised in dealing with the impending dust storm,” based on a study linking the Wuhan pneumonia virus to airborne transmission.

According to the BBC, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention does say that the new pneumonia virus can float in the air for “hours,” but they also mention that the chances of being infected, let alone outdoors, are quite low; most people are infected through droplets from close contact with someone diagnosed with the disease.

According to the report, South Korean media also found it implausible that the coronavirus was transmitted to North Korea through a dust storm in China.