Health chiefs ‘impose news blackout’ around third Russian doctor to fall from a window

Health chiefs and law enforcement have imposed a news blackout around the third coronavirus doctor to fall from a window in Russia, it has been claimed.

Alexander Shulepov, 37, is in intensive care with a fractured skull and eight broken ribs after taking part in a video which claimed he was ordered to work despite testing positive for Covid-19.

He and colleagues also warned about PPE shortages in Voronezh city.

Doctor Alexander Shulepov, 37, pictured with his son. Shulepov is in intensive care with a fractured skull and eight broken ribs after taking part in a video which claimed he was ordered to work despite testing positive for Covid-19

Shulepov pictured with his wife Maria. Maria Shulepova said the hospital’s chief doctor put the phone down on her, and medics ‘refused to talk about my husband’s condition saying ‘the accident has been discussed too widely’

Shulepov pictured with his three children. Today a local source said that Shulepov remained in ‘a medium grave state’ but that his life was not in danger

Later in hospital Shulepov made a second video to retract the claims amid suspicions he was pressured to do so.

Several days later he mysteriously fell from the upper floor of a two-storey hospital.

His wife Maria Shulepova said the hospital’s chief doctor put the phone down on her, and medics ‘refused to talk about my husband’s condition saying ‘the accident has been discussed too widely’.

Alexander Shulepov pictured with his wife Maria. Later in hospital Shulepov made a second video to retract the claims amid suspicions he was pressured to do so

Ambulance doctor Alexander Shulepov, left, and ambulance paramedic Alexander Kosyakin, right

She has not spoken to local journalists since Sunday and nor has paramedic Alexander Kosyakin who made the video revealing emergency doctor Shulepov had contracted coronavirus and that hospital chiefs were ‘forcing’ him to keep working.

Today a local source said that Shulepov remained in ‘a medium grave state’ but that his life was not in danger.

He is conscious but it is unknown if he has spoken to detectives.

The source said: ‘It is not clear if he has said anything about the reasons for what happened, as he is in intensive care, and no-one is allowed there.

‘His wife was told by officials that if she wanted updates on her husband condition she should not pass information to the media’.

Doctor Alexander Shulepov, 37, is fighting for life after falling out of window of his second floor hospital room in Voronez

Law enforcement and the Russian Investigative Committee have refused to comment on how Shulepov came to fall, according to the media.

In another case, Dr Natalya Lebedeva, 48, plunged 60ft to her death from the sixth floor of a Moscow hospital after colleagues said she was unfairly blamed for the spread of coronavirus at her clinic in Star City, near Moscow, the training centre for cosmonauts.

She had become infected with Covid-19.

Dr Yelena Nepomnyashchaya, 47, a mother of two, sustained fatal injuries after falling 60ft from a window at her Krasnoyarsk hospital.

Colleagues said she had complained about an ‘acute shortage’ of personal protection equipment for doctors and nurses.

There is no evidence of murder in any of the three cases.