A farmer watches over his sheep on the banks of a lake in Tibet. The death toll from an outbreak of pneumonic plague in northwest China has risen to three, state media has reported as authorities maintained a quarantine lockdown on a town of 10,000 people. People were seeking to flee in defiance a lock down by authorities to prevent the spread of highly infectious pneumonic plague which has claimed three lives in the area.
Police have set up checkpoints around Ziketan in Qinghai province, a town of 10,000 people, which has been put under quarantine after at least a dozen people caught the lung infection which can kill within 24 hours if untreated.
