A Russian court has ordered a woman to be returned to a quarantine facility as a precaution against coronavirus after she staged an elaborate escape and said she was being kept against her will.
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Alla Ilyina was quarantined at St Petersburg's Botkin Hospital for Infectious Diseases after she reported having a sore throat following a trip last month to China.
Ilyina described on Instagram how she had short-circuited an electronic lock on her door in order to escape and that she had not been allowed to leave despite doctors giving her a clean bill of health.
The escape prompted St Petersburg's chief sanitary doctor to sue Ilyina for flouting quarantine rules and jeopardising public health.
"Ilyina is subject to forced hospitalisation," St Petersburg's Petrogradsky District Court said, adding that her hearing had taken place in a courtroom with a germicidal lamp.
Her lawyer, Vitaly Cherkasov, said she would appeal the verdict.
Cherkasov told Reuters that Ilyina would need three negative tests for the coronavirus before she could be released.
Australian Associated Press