Anthrax outbreak in remote Russia kills boy, infects 20

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A 12-year-old boy has died and 20 people have been infected in an Anthrax outbreak in Russia's remote northern Yamalo-Nenets region, while another 90 people are hospitalised on suspicion of also having the disease.

SIBERIA (Reuters) - The rare but deadly Anthrax has come to this remote corner of Siberia.

A 12-year-old nomad boy has died in an outbreak in Russia's northern Yamalo-Nenets region.

Another 20 people are infected and 90 more are undergoing health checks.

Emergency crews evacuated some 240 people, many of them children, from a camp for reindeer herders close to the site of the outbreak.

Scientists think climate change may be to blame.

They say warmer temperatures are melting Siberia's permafrost, exposing reindeer corpses infected with anthrax in previous outbreaks decades ago.

The bacteria can hibernate for many years.

The boy is reportedly the first anthrax fatality in Russia since a major outbreak 75 years ago of this treatable disease also known as the "Siberian plague".

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