![]() Scientists also have found evidence of plague among wild animals other than rodents, including rabbits, deer, black-footed ferrets, mountain lions, coyotes-and even among domestic cats and dogs. In North America, however, plague is most commonly seen in prairie dogs, as well as other native rodents such as wood rats and squirrels. In Madagascar, for example, black rats are still the most common host. The species that carry the plague vary by region. Wagner points out that fleas can only sip very small amounts of blood so there has to be a lot of bacteria in that sip for a host to infect the flea. Rodents also likely have a high density of the bacteria in their blood, at least compared to other mammals. ![]() Wagner says it likely has something to do with their tendency to live in burrows where fleas are plentiful. Scientists aren’t certain what makes rodents such good hosts for Y. ( Here’s how infections jump from animals to people. A 2018 study concluded that plague spread widely in Europe not through rats, but via fleas and lice that lived on humans. And when the rodent dies, the fleas jump to their next host-which may be a human. pestis, it promptly passes the pathogen to its fleas. “It’s primarily a disease of rodents and their fleas,” he says.įleas live off the blood of mammals, and they especially love attaching themselves to rodents-not just black rats. But, Wagner says, they’re far from the only culprits. In addition to bubonic plague, other forms include septicemic plague, which travels in the bloodstream, and pneumonic plague, which develops in the lungs and is the only form that humans can transmit to one another.īlack rats- your average house rat-have been blamed for history’s most horrific plague pandemics. What animals can spread plague?Ĭaused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, plague is a zoonotic disease, which means animals can pass it to humans. What drives these rare plague outbreaks-and how serious is the risk to humans today? Here’s what you need to know. “I always tell people, look both ways before you cross the street before you worry about plague.” “It’s an extremely rare infection,” says Dave Wagner, director of the Biodefense and Disease Ecology Center at Northern Arizona University’s Pathogen & Microbiome Institute. sees an average of seven human cases a year, mostly bubonic plague, which is contracted from flea bites and is marked by the development of swollen, painful lymph nodes called buboes. Outbreaks of one of history’s deadliest diseases may sound scary, but thanks to antibiotics, plague is typically not deadly if treated. Later that month, a New Mexico resident was diagnosed with plague, likely from a flea brought home by a pet. In August 2021, California officials had to close parts of Lake Tahoe after a dead chipmunk tested positive for the bubonic plague. ![]() most cases occur from late spring to early fall in the West, particularly in New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, California, Oregon, and Nevada. It’s found on every continent except Oceania and Antarctica, and is particularly common in Madagascar, Peru, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. ![]() Plague was never eradicated and still circulates among mammals such as prairie dogs, jackrabbits, coyotes, black-footed ferrets, and even domestic pets.
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