Kyrgyzstan has stepped up preventive measures and control measures at border checkpoints due to information about a registered case of plague in Russia, the national news agency KABAR reported.
The Ministry of Health in Bishkek reported that the checkpoints are operating on high alert.
„Specialists are monitoring people, vehicles and cargo crossing the state border to prevent the import and spread of infectious diseases, including especially dangerous infections. The situation is under the control of the sanitary and epidemiological service, the ministry stressed.
A woman has died of pneumonic plague in the Irkutsk region of Siberia, in eastern Russia, a regional government official said last night, and according to Russian media, dozens of people have been quarantined, Agence France-Presse reported.
Local media identified the deceased woman as Daria Chipilova, a 28-year-old laboratory technician.
The Russian publication “Peoples of Baikal“ reported that the woman worked at the Institute for Combating Plague in the city of Irkutsk and probably contracted pneumonic plague from a broken test tube.
Around 200 people she may have had contact with have been quarantined, the Russian media added, without giving further details.
The Russian Health Ministry has not yet made an official statement. AFP notes that it has not been able to verify the information.
The governor of the Russian autonomous republic of Buryatia, Alexei Tsydenov, also wrote in a post on social media that a woman in the neighboring Irkutsk region had “died of the plague“.
Plague is an infectious disease caused by bacteria. Pneumonic plague is highly contagious and can be fatal if not treated promptly, according to the World Health Organization.