Lab worker dies in Siberia; around 200 quarantined over plague fears

A 28-year-old laboratory assistant at Russia's Anti-Plague Research Institute in Shelekhov, a town near Irkutsk in Siberia, died on 2 October after being hospitalised with pneumonia of "unknown origin", officials and local media said. Russian authorities have placed about 200 people who had contact with her under medical isolation.

She had told medical staff that she accidentally broke a test tube containing live biological material while working in the laboratory on 25 September, the Independent reported. Local media named the pathogen as Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, though this has not been confirmed by Russian officials.

Her condition worsened two days later and she was admitted to the district hospital in Shelekhov, where she was placed on a ventilator before she died, Euronews Albania reported, citing colleagues and independent local media. Doctors initially treated her for suspected coronavirus before her rapid deterioration prompted tests for more dangerous infections.

Russia's consumer health watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor, said it activated emergency sanitary protocols after a case of "pneumonia of unknown etiology" at the facility, and said the wider situation in the Irkutsk region "remains stable". At least 197 people with direct or indirect contact with the woman have been placed under medical isolation, more than 100 of them in hospital wards, regional outlet Liudi Baikala reported. Quarantine measures were also imposed on the district hospital, a nearby maternity unit and a local aluminium plant.

Irkutsk governor Igor Kobzev urged residents to stay calm, writing on Telegram that a regional commission had convened over a "suspected case of a particularly dangerous infection". He did not confirm the woman's death but said all identified close contacts had tested negative and showed no symptoms. Russian investigators have opened a criminal inquiry into possible workplace safety violations linked to her death.

Former Rospotrebnadzor head Gennady Onishchenko told state news agency Tass that the infection was "most likely not the plague", and that any confirmed case would not spread widely, citing cooler autumn temperatures. The institute specialises in research on dangerous pathogens, and its work has fuelled speculation that the case could be pneumonic plague, which spreads between people through airborne droplets and causes rapid fever, breathing difficulty and chest pain, and can be fatal without prompt antibiotic treatment, according to World Health Organization guidance.