Alarm grows in Siberia as second plague death reported at quarantine hospital

A second person has reportedly died of plague at a hospital in Russia’s Irkutsk region. The news comes after the death of a 28-year-old worker at a laboratory where research on the disease was being conducted.

According to the Daily Mail, Russian authorities have yet to confirm information about the second victim.

The first case involved Daria Sipilova, a laboratory technician at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute, who died on October 2 at a hospital in the city of Shelekhov. Russian media reported that she had told doctors she accidentally broke a bottle containing live plague bacteria on September 25.

However, this explanation has not been confirmed by the authorities. They have stated that no incident involving pathogenic microorganisms occurred at the institute. Following Sipilova’s death, around 197 people who had been in contact with her were placed under medical observation, while several hospitals in Irkutsk were subjected to a three-week quarantine.