Fact check: Misleading claims about Russian lab worker's death fuels fears of plague outbreak

The death of a lab worker at a plague research institute in Russia has sparked claims about a lab accident, hundreds of infections and international spread. Some of these viral narratives are misleading.

Dozens of people were reportedly placed under observation after a laboratory worker at a Russian institute dedicated to studying plague and other infectious diseases died of severe pneumonia.

The case quickly became the subject of intense speculation on social media. Posts have ranged from expressions of fear and comparisons with the COVID-19 pandemic to claims about the laboratory incident that have not been substantiated.

Claim: "For those who don't get it: in Irkutsk, a lab technician broke a flask containing the plague virus and became infected with the disease, dying a few days later," a user posted on X in Russian. "This happened on September 25, and by October 2, she was already dead. In the meantime, she had infected several hundred people." The post, which included a photo of the alleged laboratory worker, garnered over 320,000 views.

There is no independent evidence confirming that a leak of the plague pathogen occurred at the Irkutsk Antiplague Research Institute of Siberia and Far East.

On the contrary, Russia's public health authority, Rospotrebnadzor, said that two commissions investigating biosafety procedures at the institute found "no evidence of an accident involving pathogenic microorganisms." The Russian news agency TASS, citing Rospotrebnadzor, also reported that tests on the deceased employee detected no microorganisms linked to her professional activity.

Some social media users have tried to debunk the claim about a broken test tube, pointing to safety standards in high-containment laboratories, where the use of glassware may be restricted or completely banned to reduce the risk of accidents.

The Irkutsk institute does work with highly pathogenic microorganisms, including strains classified in Russia's highest pathogenicity groups, such as Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague.

However, DW could not independently verify the formally designated biosafety level of the institute's laboratories. Biosafety level, or BSL, is an international classification describing the containment measures required when handling dangerous pathogens, with BSL-4 reserved for the most hazardous agents.

DW asked the Irkutsk Antiplague Research Institute to comment on the alleged incident and its laboratory safety procedures but had received no response by the time of publication.

Claim: "The WHO appears to have updated its fact sheet on plague the same day the Irkutsk lab worker presented at hospital, with (probably) the plague." This claim appeared in a number of posts on X, each reaching thousands of users.

The World Health Organization (WHO) updated its plague fact sheet on the same day the Russian laboratory worker was hospitalized, but no evidence links the two events.