Subscriptions
Read our Monthly Magazine
And support our mission to provide fearless stories about and outside the media system
After fear-mongering for years about Ukrainian biolabs, Russia is now the culprit behind a possible plague outbreak that has left at least one person dead and hundreds of others being monitored for the deadly disease.
On Friday, a lab worker in a region of Siberia called Irkutsk was confirmed to have died of pneumonia after reportedly telling medical staff at the hospital that she had inadvertently broken a test tube containing plague bacteria while working at an anti-plague institute. She was hospitalised last Tuesday and died on Thursday, according to The Moscow Times.
The hospital where she died was placed under quarantine, and nearly 200 people with whom she had contact were reportedly placed in medical isolation to be monitored for signs of the disease. Moscow has also reportedly been put on “plague alert” and is following protocols for an “emergency sanitary regime.”
The plague is caused by a bacterium called Yersinia pestis, which circulates among some wild mammals and their fleas. People can become infected through contact with fleas or infected tissue, or in this case, through direct exposure to the live bacteria.
Once a person contracts the disease, it can spread to others through exposure to respiratory particles. The World Health Organisation (WHO) recorded 3,860 suspected cases of plague and 423 deaths worldwide from 2019 through 2025, most of which came from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar.
A Kremlin Cover-Up?
Both pro-Kremlin and opposition media in Russia have reported that the lab worker, a 28-year-old woman named Darya Shipilova, died from pneumonic plague following exposure to the bacteria in a research institute. Local government officials have also confirmed parts of the story.
Tulsi Gabbard Revives Russian Disinformation Campaign About Ukraine Biolabs
As one of her last moves as head of the US intelligence community,Tulsi Gabbard propped up a Russian disinformation campaign that was used by the Kremlin to justify its illegal invasion of Ukraine four years ago
Despite these reports, Russian authorities are denying that there was a lab accident and say the woman died of “pneumonia of unknown aetiology.” But given Russia’s history of engaging in cover-ups and secrecy, there is reason to doubt the government’s story.
Furthermore, some Russian media outlets and Russian officials are deleting earlier reports about a potential plague outbreak, raising even more questions about a possible cover-up by the Kremlin. Meanwhile, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov is demanding that the public “ignore different rumours” and that journalists stick to official statements.
Locals who live near the location of the laboratory are reportedly “outraged” by the lack of information they’re receiving from the government and have begun to panic.
Even though the Kremlin is trying to downplay the incident, the situation on the ground suggests something far more serious is going on, with lab employees and contacts of Shipilova placed under mandatory quarantine and some even reportedly escorted by the FSB to isolation centres.
On Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called on Russia to be more “transparent” about the lab worker’s death and any potential risks associated with the reported lab accident.
“I think it’s incumbent upon Russia to obviously share more information with the world,” Rubio added.
Russia has good reason to be sensitive about this topic, though. When Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, it justified its military aggression by claiming that Ukrainian biolabs near the border posed an existential threat to Russia and needed to be destroyed.
The Kremlin spent the next several years spreading conspiracy theories about the biological laboratories, saying that Ukraine was weaponising deadly pathogens and preparing for a biological attack on Russia.
Acknowledging that a deadly bacterium like the plague had escaped from one of its own laboratories would expose the hypocrisy underlying Russia’s years-long propaganda campaign — so instead of doing that, it appears they’re hoping that they can spin another disinformation campaign to make it all go away.