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Five hospitals in Russia's Irkutsk region have been placed under quarantine and a nearby aluminum plant has introduced a mask mandate after a 27-year-old researcher at the city's anti-plague institute died from the disease, according to reports from the independent outlet Lyudi Baikala and The Moscow Times.
The quarantine measures, which authorities have not formally confirmed are linked to plague, affect three municipal hospitals in Irkutsk, No. 1, No. 3 and No. 10, along with the Ivano-Matreninskaya Children's Hospital and a maternity hospital, Lyudi Baikala reported.
A healthcare source cited by the outlet said medical staff were "already openly talking about plague," even though the disease does not appear in official documentation.
The source added that selective quarantine measures are not used in cases of pneumonic plague, meaning restrictions are instead imposed simultaneously across all affected medical institutions.
The case came to light after regional authorities announced on Oct. 2 the death of a resident of the Irkutsk region from plague. The woman was identified as Darya Shipilova, 27, an employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute.
Accounts of how she contracted the disease differ: one version holds that she broke a laboratory vial containing the pathogen on Sept. 25, while another says she had recently returned from a work trip to the Buryatia region, where an outbreak had been recorded near the border with Mongolia.
Shipilova was hospitalized on Sept. 29 at a hospital in Shelekhov with symptoms of pneumonia and was placed on a ventilator before dying several days later. That hospital has since been placed under quarantine.
Institutes such as the one where Shipilova worked are designated national centers for monitoring and researching especially dangerous pathogens, including the bacterium that causes plague, and typically operate under strict biocontainment protocols given the nature of the material they handle.
According to sources cited by Lyudi Baikala, 197 people who had contact with Shipilova have been identified, of whom 189 have been hospitalized for observation, 114 at one medical facility and 63 at another, with a further 12 sent to the anti-plague institute itself.
The outlet's sources said that since Oct. 1, ambulances transporting these contacts for testing have been escorted by officers of the FSB, Russia's federal security service.
Irkutsk region Gov. Igor Kobzev said on Oct. 2 that no signs of illness had been detected among those being monitored and that laboratory test results so far had come back negative.
At the Irkutsk Aluminum Plant (IrkAZ) in Shelekhov, management introduced a mask requirement following the death, calling it a precautionary measure. "Better safe than sorry," plant director Artyom Fominykh wrote, according to Lyudi Baikala, urging employees to seek medical attention immediately if symptoms appear. Fominykh also acknowledged that conflicting information about the situation was circulating in Shelekhov.
Relatives of one woman giving birth at a quarantined maternity hospital told Lyudi Baikala that doctors, citing the plague situation, barred her husband from the delivery room despite the family having a paid contract for partner-assisted childbirth.
On the morning of Oct. 3, the administration of the nearby town of Baikalsk urged residents to temporarily avoid travel to Shelekhov and surrounding communities because of the plague death, but later deleted the post.
Plague, caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, is the same pathogen responsible for historical pandemics including the medieval Black Death. It persists today in natural rodent populations in parts of Central Asia, Mongolia and Siberia, where isolated human cases are occasionally reported, most often linked to contact with infected animals.
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