(CNN) A Russian woman who escaped a hospital ward where she was under quarantine for novel coronavirus is facing a lawsuit filed by heath authorities for endangering the public, according to Russian state media.

Alla Ilyina returned from China on January 31 and was undergoing observation at the Botkin Hospital for Infection Diseases in St. Petersburg, her lawyer Vitaly Cherkasov, told CNN.

The patient fled from the Botkin Hospital after returning to St. Petersburg from China.

She fled the hospital without permission by short-circuiting the electronic lock on the door to her ward, St. Petersburg's chief sanitary physician said in a statement Thursday.

Thursday marked the end of Ilyina's mandatory 14-day quarantine period, and Cherkasov said that his client had the right to return home.

Ilyina is now facing a lawsuit filed by St. Petersburg's chief sanitary physician with the Kuibyshevsky District Court for committing an administrative offense by breaking quarantine regulations and potentially exposing other people to the virus.

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