1910年10月,哈爾濱發現鼠疫。面對疫情,哈爾濱的中俄地方當局最初合作防疫,後因理念不同,分道揚鑣。俄方試圖干涉道外防疫,中方堅決抵制,雙方展開交涉,並將道裡道外隔離開來。隨著疫情惡化,清政府外交壓力增加,外務部派來了以伍連德為首的醫官隊伍,到哈指導防疫事務。最初,他們受哈爾濱地方官和防疫會的抵制,難以發揮應有作用。在各國使團壓力下,經過外務部與東北地方交涉後,伍連德指導防疫的權力得到東北地方官的認可,但與防疫有關的交涉權力仍歸地方官所有。此後,伍達德得到了各方的政治支持,防疫得以順利進行。哈爾濱防疫領導權之爭,實質上是一場交織著各種矛盾的複雜政治過程,既不能簡單地概括為主權之爭,或中西醫學之爭,也不能僅僅視為外交壓力或外務部干涉的結果,而是多種因素綜合作用的結果。
In November 1910 when the bubonic plague appeared in Harbin, the Russian and Chinese local authorities agreed to fight the epidemic together. Before long, however, their cooperation was broken due to different perspectives on the epidemic. The Russians tried to intervene in epidemic prevention in the Chinese district of Daowai. The Chinese local government and elites completely refused Russia's demands. After negotiations, Russians and Chinese decided to isolate Daoli, the Russian district from Daowai. When the epidemic continued to spread rapidly and the situation worsened, the Qing dynasty faced ever-greater diplomatic pressure, which forced the Foreign Ministry to send Wu Lien-Teh and other Western-educated doctors to Harbin to supervise epidemic prevention. At first, they were treated as outsiders by local officials and elites. Under the pressure of the foreign missions, the medical directive powers of the doctors had been recognized by the local officials in the Manchurian regions through long negotiations with the Foreign Ministry, while the local government in Harbin still presided over diplomatic affairs. Thereafter, the Western Epidemic Preventive Policy set down by Wu was strongly supported by the central and local governments, so that plague prevention policies were carried out smoothly. ln sum, the dispute over the leadership of epidemic preventive in Harbin was a complicated process beset by numerous tensions. lt cannot be simply summarized as a struggle over sovereignty, nor as the contradiction between traditional Chinese and Western medicine, nor yet as the result of diplomatic pressure.