{"id":32857,"date":"2026-10-11T15:03:37","date_gmt":"2026-10-11T12:03:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/?p=32857"},"modified":"2026-10-11T15:03:37","modified_gmt":"2026-10-11T12:03:37","slug":"who-irkutsk-lab-worker-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/who-irkutsk-lab-worker-death\/","title":{"rendered":"The WHO has not established the cause of death of the employee at the Russian Federation\u2019s Anti-Plague Institute"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"news-lead\">The World Health Organisation has not established the cause of death of a 28-year-old employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute, who died of severe pneumonia. Russian tests found no evidence of plague or other confirmed highly dangerous pathogens; however, the WHO has stated that, without a definitive diagnosis, an infection linked to laboratory work cannot be completely ruled out.<\/p>\n<div class=\"news-summary-box\">\n<p><strong>Briefly about the main points<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>An employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute died after contracting severe pneumonia.<\/li>\n<li>The specific pathogen and source of the infection have not yet been identified.<\/li>\n<li>Russia has announced that tests for dangerous infections have returned negative results.<\/li>\n<li>No related cases of severe pneumonia were identified among the contacts.<\/li>\n<li>The WHO does not recommend restricting travel or trade as a result of the incident.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Timeline of the illness and the results of the Russian investigations<\/h2>\n<p>According to Reuters, the deceased was <strong>Daria Shipilova<\/strong> \u2014 a staff member at the Irkutsk Research Institute for Plague Control in Siberia and the Far East. She was admitted to hospital on 29 September and died three days later.<\/p>\n<p>The specific microorganism that caused the fatal illness has not been identified. Rospotrebnadzor reported that <a href=\"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/mozhlyva-chuma-rosiia-bilyi-dim-irkutsk\/\">female employee<\/a> had been vaccinated against the infections she was working with. According to the Russian authorities, two separate inspections found no breaches of biosafety or incidents in the laboratory.<\/p>\n<h2>The people who had been in contact with her were tested following the employee\u2019s death<\/h2>\n<p>Following the death of the employee, around 200 people who may have come into contact with her were placed under quarantine restrictions or medical supervision. The Russian authorities informed the WHO that all identified contacts had been tested and their condition had been monitored for seven days.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, according to Russian data, specialists carried out more than 5,500 laboratory tests using various methods. They did not detect any pathogens causing plague or other verified particularly dangerous infections. The surveillance was completed on 9 October; no new cases of severe pneumonia were identified among those who had been in contact with infected individuals.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Two close contacts have tested positive for COVID-19.<\/li>\n<li>Three of them have a rhinovirus infection.<\/li>\n<li>In one case, bacteria of the genus Haemophilus were detected.<\/li>\n<li>The Russian authorities did not link these findings to the worker\u2019s fatal pneumonia.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>What uncertainties remain following the World Health Organisation\u2019s assessment?<\/h2>\n<p>In a statement dated 10 October, the WHO reported that the information received from Russia was insufficient to identify the causative agent of the pneumonia. Without a confirmed diagnosis, the organisation emphasised, it is impossible to definitively assess the origin of the disease and the full range of potential risks.<\/p>\n<p>The WHO has noted that the possibility of an infection linked to laboratory activities cannot be entirely ruled out at this stage. However, this statement does not constitute confirmation of a laboratory accident. Clinical, epidemiological and laboratory data are required for a further assessment.<\/p>\n<h2>Current risk assessment and next steps in the investigation<\/h2>\n<p>The WHO has no evidence of further spread of the infection or of confirmed cases <a href=\"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/world\/central-asia-border-control-irkutsk\/\">cases of the plague.<\/a> According to Russian health authorities, no such cases have been recorded in the Irkutsk Region recently either.<\/p>\n<p>The organisation does not recommend imposing restrictions on international travel or trade as a result of this incident. The WHO has offered the Russian side assistance with research into hazardous pathogens and laboratory biosafety, and has recommended continuing the analysis of available biological samples and medical records.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The cause of death of a staff member at the anti-plague institute in Irkutsk has not been established. The WHO has no evidence of the spread of infection or the plague.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":207433355,"featured_media":32856,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_description":"\u041f\u0440\u0438\u0447\u0438\u043d\u0443 \u0441\u043c\u0435\u0440\u0442\u0456 \u043f\u0440\u0430\u0446\u0456\u0432\u043d\u0438\u0446\u0456 \u043f\u0440\u043e\u0442\u0438\u0447\u0443\u043c\u043d\u043e\u0433\u043e \u0456\u043d\u0441\u0442\u0438\u0442\u0443\u0442\u0443 \u0432 \u0406\u0440\u043a\u0443\u0442\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0443 \u043d\u0435 \u0432\u0441\u0442\u0430\u043d\u043e\u0432\u0438\u043b\u0438. \u0412\u041e\u041e\u0417 \u043d\u0435 \u043c\u0430\u0454 \u0434\u043e\u043a\u0430\u0437\u0456\u0432 \u043f\u043e\u0448\u0438\u0440\u0435\u043d\u043d\u044f \u0456\u043d\u0444\u0435\u043a\u0446\u0456\u0457 \u0447\u0438 \u0447\u0443\u043c\u0438.","rank_math_title":"\u0421\u043c\u0435\u0440\u0442\u044c \u043f\u0440\u0430\u0446\u0456\u0432\u043d\u0438\u0446\u0456 \u0456\u043d\u0441\u0442\u0438\u0442\u0443\u0442\u0443 \u0432 \u0406\u0440\u043a\u0443\u0442\u0441\u044c\u043a\u0443: \u0449\u043e \u0437\u0430\u044f\u0432\u0438\u043b\u0430 \u0412\u041e\u041e\u0417","rank_math_focus_keyword":"\u0412\u041e\u041e\u0417","td_subtitle":"","subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[805619],"tags":[805624],"class_list":["post-32857","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\/32857","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=32857"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32859,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32857\/revisions\/32859"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrmedia.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}