Pneumonic Plague Scare Alerts White House: What Do Prediction Markets Say?

U.S. officials are monitoring a suspected plague incident in Siberia after a laboratory worker died and Russian authorities placed nearly 200 of her contacts under observation.

The State Department said it is monitoring the situation with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other agencies, while Axios reported that the White House is also watching developments.

Prediction market traders see relatively low odds that Russia will confirm a pneumonic plague case in anyone other than the deceased worker this month.

Traders Doubt Another Case

Polymarket traders put the chance of a new confirmed pneumonic plague case by Oct. 31 at 19% Monday morning, while the Oct. 15 contract is at 13%. The market, launched Saturday, had attracted about $13,000 in volume.

The contract excludes Daria Shipilova, the worker whose death sparked the scare. A later confirmation that Shipilova herself had pneumonic plague would not resolve the market to "Yes." A separate human case must be confirmed.

That makes the market a direct gauge of whether the incident has spread beyond Shipilova, though the odds may also reflect uncertainty over what Russia would officially confirm.

Russia Disputes Plague Reports

Shipilova, 28, worked at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute. Local reports said she broke a test tube containing Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, on Sept. 25.

She was reportedly hospitalized with severe pneumonia on Sept. 29 and died overnight on Oct. 2.

Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s public health agency, disputes that account. It said Shipilova died from pneumonia of unknown origin, tests found no microorganisms connected to her work and investigators found no accident involving dangerous pathogens.

The head of neighboring Buryatia initially said Shipilova had died of plague before changing the statement to say she may have died from the disease.

Nearly a Week With No Secondary Cases

Russian authorities said testing of Shipilova’s contacts found two COVID-19 cases and two rhinovirus infections, but no plague.

Pneumonic plague usually develops quickly, with symptoms typically appearing within one to three days, according to the CDC. It generally spreads through close contact with respiratory droplets, and doctors can treat it with antibiotics if caught early.

The cause of Shipilova’s death remains disputed, but nearly a week after her hospitalization, no secondary plague case has been reported.

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