2024-02-15 18:30:37
Isolated case or risk of psychosis: a rare human case of bubonic plague was identified a few days ago in Deschutes County in Oregon, in the northwest of the United States.
The patient, currently undergoing treatment, was probably infected by his cat. “All close contacts of the resident and their pet have been contacted and given medications to prevent illness,” said Dr. Richard Fawcett, Deschutes County Health Officer. But how might this patient have been infected by his cat? By what mechanisms is human contamination by bubonic plague possible? Should you be worried if you have a cat?
A disease still in circulation
If the mere mention of the bubonic plague makes one shudder, it is because it is the disease which caused the Black Death, this pandemic which decimated at least a third of the European population in the Middle Ages. Many think it is extinct, but it still remains a disease still in circulation today. “It is still prevalent today in Africa, Asia and America and is one of the diseases currently re-emerging in the world,” underlines the Pasteur Institute.
If the disease is rare in developed countries, “the United States is not spared: indigenous cases of human plague are reported every year on the west coast,” recalls the Pasteur Institute. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the main federal health agency, there are an average of seven cases of plague in humans each year in the United States. In Oregon, the last reported case of bubonic plague dates back to 2015, according to the health administration of this state of more than 4.2 million inhabitants.
“Many people don’t know that plague is endemic in parts of the United States,” Dr. Erin Phipps, a public health veterinarian in New Mexico, told the New York Times. It’s not a disease of the past.”
Human contamination through animals
How do these human contaminations occur? “Plague is a disease of rodents, mainly carried by rats, and transmitted to humans through flea bites from infected rodents,” explains the Pasteur Institute. In practice, plague is caused by the bacteria “Yersinia pestis”, which circulates among various populations of wild rodents. Then, fleas that feed on infected rodents can transmit plague to other animals, including cats. If these pets become infected by chasing an infected rodent or through a contaminated flea bite, then they can transmit the disease to humans.
“Since 1977, 407 cats in New Mexico have been diagnosed with plague,” Dr. Phipps said. One of the most at-risk groups is pets that hunt. And cats are very susceptible to plague, and it can be fatal for them,” she added.
The American patient’s cat, which showed symptoms of the plague, died as a result of its infection, local health authorities said.
Effective support
In humans, symptoms of plague appear up to eight days following infection, and can include fever, nausea, weakness, chills and muscle pain. If not diagnosed in time, bubonic plague can progress to septicemic plague – an infection of the bloodstream – or pneumonic plague, which affects the lungs. Two much more serious illnesses.
“Fortunately, this case was identified and treated in the early stages of the disease, which poses little risk to the community,” authorities assured in a press release. Thus, when the disease is diagnosed at an early stage, treatment with antibiotics can cure it.
And what is the risk of contracting bubonic plague in France? A priori, it is very limited. According to the Pasteur Institute, the last recorded human cases date back to 1945, in Corsica. But when traveling to the most affected areas of the globe such as “the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Peru and especially Madagascar, which is the country with the most human cases of plague in the world (between 250 and 500 cases per year)”, the biomedical research center recommends “avoiding contact with rodents and protecting yourself from flea bites with skin repellents” to reduce the risk of contamination.
1708035624
#contamination #man #cat
