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Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday that a suspected plague case at a Russian research lab is not a reason for alarm. He warned, however, that an infection of that kind could spread fast if it escaped.
Speaking to reporters at Joint Base Andrews before leaving for Europe, Rubio said the U.S. knows only what Moscow has shared. According to Russia, a lab worker appears to have been infected, and officials fear the disease may have spread inside the country.
Rubio pointed to the quarantines Russia has imposed and noted that travel between the two countries is very limited. “I don’t think it’s cause for alarm, but it is cause for focus,” he said, adding that Washington is monitoring the case closely.
The case involves Darya Shipilova, 28, who worked at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute of Siberia and the Far East. She fell ill at work and died Oct. 2, and nearly 200 people have since been quarantined in Siberia.
Did the Russian lab worker die of plague?
Officially, the cause hasn’t been confirmed. Last week, a senior Russian official, Alexey Tsydenov, wrote on social media that Shipilova had died of plague. The official later edited the post to say she had “possibly” died of it.
Russia’s public health regulator has since attributed her death to pneumonia of unknown etiology. That is the medical term for a lung infection whose cause doctors have not identified.
The World Health Organization said Monday that it was aware of reports of the death but that no cause had been officially confirmed. Based on unofficial information, the agency described the risk to the general population as low and said it would update its assessment as details emerge.
Local Russian media have linked the infection to an accident at the lab. That account has not been confirmed.
How does pneumonic plague spread, and can it be treated?
Plague is caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterium carried mainly by rodents such as rats and prairie dogs. Fleas usually pass it to people. The disease still circulates naturally in Siberia, Central Asia, Africa and the Americas.
Pneumonic plague, the form suspected in Shipilova’s death, attacks the lungs. It is the rarest type but the most dangerous because it can pass directly between people through respiratory droplets. That person-to-person spread is what makes fast transmission a concern.
Untreated, pneumonic plague can kill up to 100% of the people it infects. A 10- to 14-day course of antibiotics can cure it if treatment starts soon after infection.
Major outbreaks of this form are rare. The only large one on record struck China in the 1910s.