By order of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, an interagency commission has been established to prevent the importation and spread of plague from Russia's Irkutsk region into Armenia. The commission will operate as a consultative body, and its composition and working procedures have been approved by annexes to the prime minister's decision.
According to the decision, the chairman of the commission must ensure the organization of its work and promptly submit necessary proposals to the prime minister on matters requiring interagency coordination. The health minister has been tasked with ensuring the commission's organizational and technical support, with the participation of the "National Center for Disease Control and Prevention" CJSC, and with appointing the commission secretary within five working days after the decision enters into force.
Within the same period, the heads of bodies and organizations represented on the commission must submit to the health minister the details of the official representing their body, the person responsible for operational information exchange and their substitute, as well as official contact means, and must promptly update this information in case of changes.
The chairman of the commission must convene the commission's first session within ten working days after the decision enters into force, for the purpose of assessing the risk of plague importation and spread from the Irkutsk region, coordinating preventive measures and discussing the current state of preparedness. Until then, in the event of grounds for an urgent response, the commission will operate under a special procedure.
The legal acts necessary for implementing the commission's recommendations will be adopted, and the measures will be carried out by the authorized bodies on the grounds and in the manner prescribed by law.
The creation of a commission over the risk of plague importation from the Irkutsk region indicates that the issue is being treated as serious and time-consuming. The commission's status as a consultative body implies that decisions will be made through interagency coordination, which usually lengthens the process but at the same time makes it possible to draw on the professional potential of various agencies.
The tasks assigned to the health ministry — related to organizational and technical support and the provision of professional information — effectively mean that the main burden of oversight and prevention falls on that department. The five- and ten-working-day deadlines are quite tight, which may indicate that the executive wants to respond quickly to a possible threat without waiting for the situation to escalate.
It remains to be seen what specific assessments the commission's first session will give to the risks coming from Irkutsk and whether the measures taken will be preventive in nature or will require stricter restrictions. At this point it is difficult to say how real the threat is, but the very fact that the commission has been created is a serious signal.
