The Trump administration is monitoring a suspected pneumonic plague death that has caused panic in Russia and led to hundreds of people being placed under quarantine, according to reports.
Darya Shipilova, a 28-year-old researcher at the Anti-Plague Research Institute in Shelekhov, Irkutsk, was reportedly exposed to live Yersinia pestis bacteria when she accidentally broke a test tube containing the pathogen while collecting samples.
She is understood to have been hospitalized on 29 September with severe pneumonia of “unknown origin” and placed on a ventilator, but died two days later.
The Trump administration “is aware, monitoring the outbreak, and assessing options,” an official told Axios.
Authorities additionally quarantined an entire hospital and placed scores of people who had come into contact with her under medical observation. However, none of the identified contacts showed symptoms, and their test results have come back negative.
Regional Gov. Igor Kobzev declined to identify the illness, referring to it only as “a dangerous infectious disease” but canceled all public events in the region.
Russia’s public health agency, meanwhile, only said Shipilova had “pneumonia of unknown etiology” and that further testing found no microorganisms linked to her work, according to Axios. Agency officials said that the situation in the region is stable.
Shipilova, who fell ill while on an expedition with other researchers near Russia’s eastern border with Mongolia, reportedly told medical staff that she had accidentally broken a test tube containing live bacteria while collecting samples for testing, according to news outlet Lyudi Baikala.
Plague is a rare and severe infectious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis.