Odd News Roundup: To lift lockdown gloom, Israelis keep calm and carry on screaming; 'I'm not a cat,' says lawyer after Zoom filter mishap and more

Using global rates of new infections with the pandemic disease, coupled with estimations of viral load, Bath University maths expert Kit Yates worked out there are around two quintillion - or two billion billion - SARS-CoV-2 virus particles in the world at any one time.

Following is a summary of current odd news briefs.

To lift lockdown gloom, Israelis keep calm and carry on screaming

Tired of COVID-19 confinement and seeking both communion and emotional release, some Israelis have taken to group screaming. A record vaccine rollout has done little to ease Israel's pandemic curbs. Next month's election - the fourth in two years, due to coalition infighting and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's legal woes - has many complaining of malaise.

'I'm not a cat,' says lawyer after Zoom filter mishap

When Judge Roy Ferguson opened up virtual proceedings of the 394th Judicial District Court in Texas on Zoom on Tuesday, he was not expecting to see two lawyers and a kitten. The cute blue-eyed "cat" in the bottom right corner was actually county attorney Rod Ponton, covered by a filter.

COVID maths: All the virus in the world would fit in a coke can

All the COVID-causing virus circulating in the world right now could easily fit inside a single cola can, according to a calculation by a British mathematician whose sum exposes just how much devastation is caused by minuscule viral particles. Using global rates of new infections with the pandemic disease, coupled with estimations of viral load, Bath University maths expert Kit Yates worked out there are around two quintillion - or two billion billion - SARS-CoV-2 virus particles in the world at any one time.

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