Story By: Anastasia Smirnova, Sub-Editor:  Joseph Golder, Agency:  Newsflash

This Russian doctor who works with children with respiratory problems allegedly hid the fact she had travelled to Austria – apparently to the coronavirus hotbed Tyrol – and carried on working.

The doctor named in reports as Irina Asherova, whose age is not reported, is the head of the pulmonology department and works with children with respiratory problems in a medical clinic in the city of Yaroslavl in western Russia’s Yaroslavl Oblast region.

Images show that the doctor appears to have visited the Serfaus municipality in the Landeck district of Austria’s Tyrol region, the centre of the country’s COVID-19 pandemic, but she reportedly hid her trip from her colleagues before immediately going back to work on her return.

However, the information about her trip was soon discovered, forcing local authorities to shut down the department and send all the doctors working there to quarantine, according to reports.

Representatives of the medical clinic said: “There is no alternative for this department, this is why we had to stop treating patients for 14 days.”

Reports say that now Asherova could be fined 300,000 RUB (3,162 GBP) for failing to self-quarantine. She might lose her job and even be criminally persecuted if it turns out she had infected anyone, according to reports.

No dates for the trip have been reported.

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