Pneumonic Plague Has Been Detected In The Irkutsk Region Of The Russian Federation

• 2.10.2026, 11:57

The first patient has died.

In the Irkutsk Region of the Russian Federation, the Shelekhov District Hospital was placed under quarantine following the death of a patient who had worked at an anti-plague institute. “People of Lake Baikal” and Mash, citing sources, report that she had the pulmonary form of the plague. The woman returned from a business trip to Buryatia with symptoms of pneumonia and was placed on a ventilator. Initially, doctors suspected a severe case of COVID-19, but the diagnosis of plague was made after she was hospitalized, according to (Shot). Authorities have not yet disclosed the diagnosis.

Irkutsk Region Governor Igor Kobzev stated that restrictions were imposed due to suspicion of a “particularly dangerous infection.” The regional government held an emergency meeting of the Sanitary and Anti-Epidemic Commission, attended by the head of Rospotrebnadzor Anna Popova. Everyone who has been in contact with the patient is under medical observation. According to authorities, they show no signs of infection, and their test results are negative.

No cases of human plague infection have been reported in Russia since 2017. Natural foci of plague persist in Mongolia. In 2023, Mongolia’s National Center for the Study of Zoonotic Infections identified 137 such foci in 17 regions of the country, including areas near the border with Russia.

Plague is an acute infectious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. The main forms of the disease are bubonic, pneumonic, and septic. Most often, humans become infected through the bites of infected fleas found on rodents. The pneumonic form can be transmitted from person to person via the respiratory tract.