MOSCOW — Thirteen members of a nomadic Siberian community have been hospitalized after a heat wave thawed the carcass of an anthrax-infected reindeer and sparked an outbreak of the disease.
Around 1,500 of the animals have died from the highly infectious disease since Sunday, the government of Russia's Yamalo-Nenets autonomous district announced on its website Tuesday. A state of emergency has been imposed throughout the region in western Siberia due to the incident — the first of its kind since 1941.
The carcass of a reindeer thought to have died from anthrax decades ago thawed and released the bacteria, sending the disease rippling through a population of animals already weakened by unusually high temperatures, according to local officials. Temperatures in the Yamal tundra above the Arctic Circle have hit highs of 95 degrees this summer, compared to an average of 77 degrees.
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