Trump plans Putin call over Russian lab worker’s death

WASHINGTON

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Oct. 6 he had scheduled a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin over a laboratory worker’s death in Siberia, as Washington and the World Health Organization called on Moscow to provide more information.

Russian authorities say the woman died of pneumonia of undetermined cause. Reports that she contracted plague at work have not been confirmed.

“I have a call scheduled, yes,” Trump told reporters at the White House, adding that the conversation would take place “very soon.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio also urged Moscow to disclose more details during a visit to Iceland.

“We encourage Russia to be transparent and share more information with the world so that all of us could react accordingly and appropriately,” he said.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the State Department had sent Moscow a diplomatic communication warning that withholding details would run counter to its international health obligations.

Russian news outlet People of Baikal identified the worker as 28-year-old Darya Shipilova, an employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute.

It reported that she may have contracted pneumonic plague through contact with a broken test tube.

Irkutsk Governor Igor Kobzev said on Oct. 5 that tests had found no microorganisms linked to her work in her biological samples.

He said the cause of her pneumonia remained undetermined.

The WHO said Russian authorities had informed it that no plague case had been recorded in Irkutsk.

Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus nevertheless requested further information on the pneumonia case and urged timely, complete and transparent reporting to clarify conflicting accounts.

The agency’s preliminary assessment put the public health risk at moderate to low in Irkutsk, low across Russia and very low in the WHO European region. It said the assessment would be updated as more information became available.

Pneumonic plague is a bacterial infection affecting the lungs that can spread through respiratory particles. It can be fatal without prompt treatment, but early antibiotic treatment is effective, according to the WHO.