Newsweek – Russian authorities have dismissed growing speculation over reports of an unidentified virus that causes patients to cough up blood and suffer from prolonged high fever, saying no new pathogens have been detected.
The rumors, which originated on the Telegram channel SHOT and were amplified by local media, centered on patients exhibiting severe respiratory symptoms but testing negative for influenza and COVID-19.
Officials now attribute the cases to common respiratory infections, including Mycoplasma pneumoniae.
Rospotrebnadzor, a Russian agency responsible for overseeing consumer rights protection and public health, said in a statement that there is “no evidence of a new or unidentified virus circulating on the territory of the Russian Federation.”
The speed with which viral rumors can trigger public concern is a growing challenge for health officials in Russia and globally.
Claims of a mysterious respiratory illness come amid lingering sensitivities from the COVID-19 pandemic, where early miscommunication and underreporting contributed to delayed containment.
Authorities in Moscow moved quickly to investigate and quash the reports.
But there has long been widespread distrust in Russian authorities when it comes to transparency.
For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, multiple doctors said they did not trust the COVID-19 vaccine touted by President Vladimir Putin.
After Russia’s health ministry announced that the production of the vaccine developed by the Gamaleya Institute outside of Moscow had begun in 2020, 52 percent of 3,000 medics surveyed said they would not take it.
Reports about an “unknown virus” first surfaced on March 29 on SHOT, a Russian breaking news Telegram channel with purported links to various federal agencies.
It said that patients in multiple Russian cities were reporting high fevers, body aches and severe coughing that persisted for weeks, which sometimes included blood.
But tests for influenza A, B, and SARS-CoV-2, which could be responsible for these symptoms, reportedly came back negative …
