Rubio Presses Russia for Transparency After Lab Worker’s Plague Death
US demands more info on Russian lab worker's death as plague fears rise. Officials confirm no outbreak, but transparency remains key.
POLICY WIRE — Irkutsk, Russia — U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has called on Russian authorities to provide more clarity following the death of a 28-year-old laboratory technician at an anti-plague institute in Siberia, where officials have denied implementing any special measures.
The incident occurred last week when Darya Shipilova, a worker at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute, reportedly died after a lab accident involving a broken test tube. While some media outlets speculated that she may have contracted pneumonic plague, Russian health officials have stated that postmortem tests did not confirm the presence of the disease.
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Russian authorities emphasized that the cause of her death remains undetermined and that no new cases of illness have been reported among other staff members. The World Health Organization assessed the risk of a broader outbreak as moderate to low in the region, with very low risk elsewhere. Meanwhile, the U.S. has urged Moscow to be more transparent about the situation, with Secretary Rubio calling it a ’cause for focus’ but not alarm.
Reporting by Policy-Wire (PW)
