The death of an employee at a plague control laboratory in the Russian province of Irkutsk, amid suspicions of pneumonic plague, has raised a wave of concern and speculation about the health situation in the region, in light of conflicting information from local officials and health authorities, and reports of quarantining a number of hospitals and contacts of the deceased.
And so far, the Russian authorities have not officially confirmed that the death was caused by the plague, while the Russian Federal Authority for Consumer Rights and Human Welfare "Rosoborbandzor" announced that the case is related to "pneumonia of unknown origin," stressing that the health and epidemiological situation in Irkutsk and the cities of Irkutsk and Shilkhov is "stable."
Death of a laboratory worker
The case began to come to light on October 2, when Russian channels on Telegram, including those linked to security institutions, reported the death of an employee of a plague control institution in the Siberian city of Irkutsk, amid suspicion of pneumonic plague.
Daria Shipilova, 28, was reportedly taken to a hospital in the city of Shilkhov on September 29, before dying two days later.
Following her death, the hospital was reportedly quarantined, while around 200 people who had come into contact with her were taken into quarantine.
But the mystery has extended to the source of the potential injury, with different narratives being offered; One reported being infected after returning from Thailand, while another said she accidentally broke a test tube containing the plague-causing agent while working in the lab.
A third novel went on to say that she had finally returned from a work assignment in the Republic of Buryatia, where there is a natural epicenter of the plague near the border with Mongolia, without official confirmation of any of these accounts.
Hospital quarantine and precautionary measures
Concerns mounted after independent regional media outlet Lyudi Baikala reported on October 4 that three hospitals in Irkutsk and a maternity hospital had been placed under three-week quarantine.
The outlet quoted a source in the health sector as saying that doctors were “talking openly about the plague,” while the Irkutsk aluminum plant in Shilkhov imposed the wearing of masks as a precaution.
And yet, health authorities still avoid confirming a plague case, which has opened up questions about the truth of what is going on and the transparency of the information available to the public.
contradictory statements
The conflicting statements of the officials added to the uncertainty. On October 2, Buryatia President Alexei Tsedinov said that Shipilova had died from the plague, before later modifying his statement that she “may have died from the plague.”
In another incident, the municipality of Baykalsk called on residents to avoid traveling to Shilkhov due to "unofficial information about a plague case," but the publication was later deleted.
Igor Kobzev, the governor of Irkutsk province, announced an emergency meeting with Russia's top health official Anna Popova over the suspected case of a "high-risk infection", without later revealing additional details about its nature.
The Kremlin got in on the case line on October 5, when its spokesman Dmitry Peskov called on citizens not to listen to “various rumors.”
What did the state media say?
The ambiguity was not limited to official statements, as questions emerged about the way the Russian media dealt with the issue.
And according to Lloyd Baikala, Rain TV has deleted five Telegram posts related to talk of the plague, including one that reported symptoms on some people who had come into contact with the deceased employee and were placed in quarantine.
Gennady Onishchenko, the former head of the Rospoterpendzor, was quoted by the official TASS news agency as saying it was "unlikely to be a plague".
Nor have Russia's main state-controlled television networks used the word “plague” in their news bulletins since the case went public on October 2.
And in contrast, social media platforms have witnessed a wide circulation of the issue, as data from the "Telegram" analysis tool TGStat showed that news and media channels used the word "plague" 4,437 times on October 2, before the number rose to 5,993 times on the fifth of the same month.
Concerns among the population
And conflicting accounts have raised concerns among residents, with residents of Irkutsk and Shilkhov reportedly turning to pharmacies to buy antibiotics that could be used to treat the plague.
The governor of Irkutsk's post on the suspicion of a "high-risk infection" also provoked an unusual reaction, amid demands from users to disclose the nature of the disease and criticism of the authorities for lack of information.
And a number of Russian journalists and commentators criticized the official narrative, wondering why the nature of the infection was not clearly revealed, while the amendments and deletions that affected some of the statements of officials and local publications contributed to increasing suspicions instead of calming them.
Is there a risk of a large outbreak?
The likelihood of the disease spreading remains linked, first, to proving that the employee actually had pneumonic plague, and second, to knowing whether she had transmitted the infection to other people.
Pneumonic plague affects the lungs and can be transmitted between humans through respiratory droplets in close contact. And the disease can develop quickly, but early treatment with antibiotics can be effective.
And the last recorded case in Russia, according to the report, dates back to 2016, when a ten-year-old boy was injured in the Altai Republic before receiving treatment.
Epidemiologist Mikhail Favorov said the hospital where Shipilova was treated had a "high risk of infection," while the risk was much lower for people who had come into contact with her before she was hospitalized.
But he largely ruled out a city-wide outbreak, provided that all contacts had been quarantined, noting that the authorities were aware of the seriousness of dealing with such cases and had clear instructions and procedures to deal with them.
And between official denials, local reports and precautionary measures, there is still no publicly available evidence of a plague outbreak in Irkutsk. But conflicting statements, the deletion of some publications and the imposition of quarantine measures have kept open questions about the nature of the laboratory employee's death, the scale of the measures taken, and whether the Russian authorities will reveal additional information that resolves the escalating controversy.
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