678
Russian lab worker dies of suspected plague after ‘being exposed to virus by broken test tube’
(www.independent.co.uk)
this post was submitted on 04 Oct 2026
678 points (99.1% liked)
World News
58351 readers
2469 users here now
A community for discussing events around the World
Rules:
-
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
-
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
-
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed.
-
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
-
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF OCTOBER 19 2025
-
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
-
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
-
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
Lemmy World Partners
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
Ask Historians !askhistorians@lemmy.world
Recommendations
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/
- Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Hopefully it's contained, because if we get another pandemic conservatives are going to do everything in their power to make it kill as many people as possible.
Maybe that's the accelerationists goal. Retreat in their bunkers, use ai to run things outside while humans die en masse, and then "rebuild society from its ashes".
They'll mostly be successful in killing their own voter base, which would ultimately turn out positively?
I think that it'd be pretty hard to describe a plague pandemic in any terms approaching "positively".
The black death caused the renaissance¹, and the end of feudalism in Europe. I'd say that was pretty positive (eventually), despite the overall tragedy.
IDK an irradication of boomers, antivaxers, and conservatives would be approaching a positive outcome.
Or it disproportionately kills the most economically oppressed like always, spreads paranoia and destroys community trust, leading to another right wing surge.
So just fuck the disabled and immunocompromised?
And babies!
The Epstein class is way ahead of you on that front
"Some of you may die, but it's a sacrifice I am willing to make"
There is a way to rationalize all this but it's obviously extremely cruel.
(A reminder that wishing your political enemies die by their own hand is... not great.)
I thought you folks loved democracy.
Isn't the saying "hate the game, love the players".
Idk about ‘love’, that's rather in the Christian “love the sinner, hate the sin”. Outside of that, it's just “don't hate the player”.
But anyway, in this case I don't so much hate them as support their right to choose their fate. However, the real victims here are immunocompromised people, those who can't use vaccines, the elderly and children who are collateral damage by getting infected from the unvaccinated.
And then, since the ‘game’ was brought on by the conservative folks upon themselves and others via their choices, why shouldn't I blame them?
It's like eradication but also irradiation for some reason.
and Democrats! that would be great
I’d like to know what the “live biological samples” were.
Earlier articles said it was Pneumonic Plague. Maybe the independent is taking a step back from that since there's nothing definitive, but it doesn't really matter right now (note that this position is different from saying it doesn't matter at all, or saying to not keep your ear to the ground).
If it's the plague then it's treatable with antibiotics, but not the first line ones, and it has to be treated quickly. As we all should know by now if it's a virus you can only treat the symptoms until there's a vaccine.
the pneumonic plague is more lethal than the bubonic, the classic one in medieval times, eventhough its the same bacteria. you need to be treated within 1day, or it becomes septicemic.
Let's hope it was something else, then.
What I've heard was Y. Pestis, Yersinia Pestis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yersinia_pestis
I mean... Aren't the conservatives going to do that anyway?
The number of people possible will be higher
It's way cheaper this way
Well, this time around, MAGA conservatives have proven that they can indeed wear masks so maybe... naw. They'll come up with some reason not to again.
I'm hoping there is one, simply because the same thing will happen again.
The Left will follow instructions and survive, the Right will die in numbers large enough to affect elections
Totally what happened. We now have a leftist president and congress. The right wing is all dead.
No matter if instructions are followed, there is always risk, especially to vulnerable people.
Yeah, and those of us who are on the left and immunocompromised are fucked. I understand where you’re coming from, but this is a bad take.