00:00Russia is facing a possible plague scare after a woman reportedly died after contracting pneumonia of an unknown cause.
00:07Reports suggest she may have died of pneumonic plague, a less common but severe form of plague that can spread
00:13from person to person.
00:14The woman had been working for the Anti-Plague Institute in the Siberian region.
00:18According to several media reports, cases of such a plague have occurred in the past.
00:23People think the plague is gone. It was something that occurred 500 years ago.
00:28And it's not. It's here. You know, it's here amongst us.
00:33If you live in the right parts of the world, I live in the United Kingdom. We don't have it
00:37here.
00:37But occasionally it even crops up in the United States. And that's because it's in wild animals.
00:44And unless you get rid of those wild animals, which, of course, is not possible, then you're not going to
00:51get rid of the bacteria.
00:53It's just something that is with us.
00:55Pneumonic plague, which causes lung failure, can be fatal if not treated early, according to the World Health Organization.
01:02Already there are existing antibiotics to tackle it.
01:05With pneumonic plague, it can be spread by coughing.
01:09Since the infections in your lungs, if you cough, you can spread it to another person.
01:13But that doesn't travel very far.
01:16And so you really need to be face-to-face contact with that person to get pneumonic plague.
01:20Reports further indicate that as many as 200 people with whom she may have had contact are under quarantine.
01:27But Russian officials have stressed that post-mortem tests had not yet detected the disease.
