Russia pressed on plague reports
President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he would speak very soon with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the reported plague death of a laboratory technician, as Washington and the United Nations called for transparency from Moscow.
Russian authorities denied that they were imposing antiplague measures and played down the reports of an incident at a plague research institute in Siberia’s Irkutsk region last week.
But Washington is showing growing concern, with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio calling on Russia to be open about the situation. The World Health Organization (WHO) issued a similar appeal on Tuesday.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the US Department of State had sent Russia a confidential diplomatic communication, known as a demarche, warning Moscow that failure to disclose details runs counter to its international health obligations.
Pneumonic plague?
Russian news outlet People of Baikal reported on Friday that the dead woman—named as 28-year-old Darya Shipilova—may have contracted pneumonic plague from a broken test tube.
Other media reported a possible link between her death and a lab accident at the facility.
The People of Baikal outlet also said up to 200 people with whom she may have had contact were under quarantine.
But Russian authorities say the cause of death is not confirmed and health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor has denied claims circulating in a document online that special measures had been put in place.
Russian officials said postmortem tests had not detected the disease.
Irkutsk Regional Gov. Igor Kobzev said Monday that a Rospotrebnadzor inspection had found the woman died of pneumonia and the cause was “undetermined.”
Conflicting reports
The WHO said that an update received on Tuesday from Russia stressed that “no case of this dangerous disease has been recorded in the city of Irkutsk.”
But its director, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, later urged Moscow to be transparent, saying the WHO had “requested further information” on the cause of the pneumonia case and other details.
“Timely, complete and transparent information sharing under the International Health Regulations is essential to clarify conflicting reports and enable an accurate assessment of potential public health risks,” he wrote on X.
Plague is a bacterial disease that can occur in several forms, including pneumonic plague, which is the most contagious type and can be transmitted by respiratory means. Bubonic plague is transmitted by infected fleas.
Pneumonic plague, which causes lung failure, can be fatal if not treated early, according to the WHO.
An international conference on plague and other infectious diseases will be held in Irkutsk from Oct. 21 to Oct. 22, although organizers said it was “unrelated to the recent death of an employee of the antiplague institute.”
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