{"id":32123,"date":"2026-10-05T19:52:26","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T16:52:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/?p=32123"},"modified":"2026-10-05T19:52:26","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T16:52:26","slug":"central-asia-border-control-irkutsk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/central-asia-border-control-irkutsk\/","title":{"rendered":"Suspected case of plague in Russia: neighbouring countries tighten border controls"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"news-lead\">Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan have tightened or introduced additional public health and epidemic control measures following reports of a possible case of pneumonic plague in Russia\u2019s Irkutsk Oblast. Uzbekistan has raised the alert level of its relevant services. The cause for concern was the death of an employee at a local anti-plague institute; however, the Russian authorities maintain that there is no laboratory confirmation of the plague.<\/p>\n<div class=\"news-summary-box\">\n<p><strong>Briefly about the main points<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Kyrgyzstan has placed all health and quarantine checkpoints on high alert.<\/li>\n<li>Kazakhstan has not identified any passengers with symptoms of dangerous infectious diseases.<\/li>\n<li>Uzbekistan has stepped up the readiness of its relevant services, whilst Tajikistan has intensified its checks.<\/li>\n<li>Mongolia has asked Russia for an official explanation regarding the incident.<\/li>\n<li>Reports that five hospitals in Irkutsk had been closed for quarantine have been denied.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<h2>What measures have been put in place at the borders?<\/h2>\n<p>The Kyrgyz Ministry of Health has reported that all health and quarantine checkpoints at the state border are operating under enhanced measures. Checks cover people, vehicles and cargo; their aim is to prevent the import and spread of <a href=\"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/mozhlyva-chuma-rosiia-bilyi-dim-irkutsk\/\">infectious diseases<\/a>, particularly those that are especially dangerous.<\/p>\n<p>On 5 October, Kazakhstan announced preventive measures and health and quarantine controls at border crossing points. At the time of the announcement, no passengers on any mode of transport had been identified as having a high temperature, symptoms of illness or suspected cases of a particularly dangerous infection. The risk of such an infection being introduced there was preliminarily assessed as low.<\/p>\n<p>Uzbekistan\u2019s Sanitary and Epidemiological Committee has stepped up the readiness of the services responsible for preventing the importation of particularly dangerous infections, and is monitoring data from the Russian authorities and the World Health Organisation. Tajikistan has stepped up checks at border crossings.<\/p>\n<h2>Mongolia has asked the Russian side for an explanation<\/h2>\n<p>On 5 October, Mongolia\u2019s National Centre for Zoonotic Diseases announced that it had approached the Russian side to seek an official explanation.<\/p>\n<p>According to the reply received by the centre, there is a suspicion of <a href=\"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/karantyn-irkuysk-pidozra-chuma\/\">plague in the Irkutsk Region<\/a> This has not been confirmed, and no incidents have been recorded at the institute whilst working with pathogenic microorganisms. Mongolia has natural foci of plague and regularly carries out its own anti-epidemic measures.<\/p>\n<h2>What is known about the death of a staff member at the institute and the quarantine<\/h2>\n<p>Concerns arose following the death of a 28-year-old employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute <strong>Daria Shipilova<\/strong>. Rospotrebnadzor cited \u00abpneumonia of unknown aetiology\u00bb as the cause of death and stated that investigations had not established any link between it and work involving dangerous pathogens. Reuters and AP also reported that there were no confirmed cases of plague.<\/p>\n<p>Following the woman\u2019s death, dozens of people were placed under medical observation. Reuters reported on quarantine measures and the requirement to wear face masks at a nearby aluminium plant, whilst the Russian authorities stated that there were no new cases of the dangerous infection.<\/p>\n<p>On 5 October, regional authorities and healthcare facilities denied reports that five hospitals in Irkutsk had allegedly been completely closed for quarantine. Hospitals Nos. 1, 3 and 10, as well as the Ivano-Matreninskaya Children\u2019s Hospital, stated that they were operating as normal. Selective quarantine measures were in place at Shelekhov Hospital, where the deceased had been treated.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Russia has not confirmed an outbreak of plague in the Irkutsk Region. Following the death of a female employee at the institute, Central Asian countries have stepped up their monitoring.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":207433355,"featured_media":32122,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_description":"\u0420\u043e\u0441\u0456\u044f \u043d\u0435 \u043f\u0456\u0434\u0442\u0432\u0435\u0440\u0434\u0438\u043b\u0430 \u0441\u043f\u0430\u043b\u0430\u0445 \u0447\u0443\u043c\u0438 \u0432 \u0406\u0440\u043a\u0443\u0442\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0456\u0439 \u043e\u0431\u043b\u0430\u0441\u0442\u0456. \u041f\u0456\u0441\u043b\u044f \u0441\u043c\u0435\u0440\u0442\u0456 \u043f\u0440\u0430\u0446\u0456\u0432\u043d\u0438\u0446\u0456 \u0456\u043d\u0441\u0442\u0438\u0442\u0443\u0442\u0443 \u043a\u0440\u0430\u0457\u043d\u0438 \u0426\u0435\u043d\u0442\u0440\u0430\u043b\u044c\u043d\u043e\u0457 \u0410\u0437\u0456\u0457 \u043f\u043e\u0441\u0438\u043b\u0438\u043b\u0438 \u043a\u043e\u043d\u0442\u0440\u043e\u043b\u044c.","rank_math_title":"\u041b\u0435\u0433\u0435\u043d\u0435\u0432\u0430 \u0447\u0443\u043c\u0430 \u0432 \u0406\u0440\u043a\u0443\u0442\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0443: \u0449\u043e \u0432\u0456\u0434\u043e\u043c\u043e \u043f\u0440\u043e \u043c\u043e\u0436\u043b\u0438\u0432\u0438\u0439 \u0432\u0438\u043f\u0430\u0434\u043e\u043a","rank_math_focus_keyword":"\u0406\u0440\u043a\u0443\u0442\u0441\u044c\u043a","td_subtitle":"","subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[805619],"tags":[805624],"class_list":["post-32123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-805624"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/207433355"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32123"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32125,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32123\/revisions\/32125"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}