LA Woman Hospitalized With Bubonic Plague

Source


I may be mistaken, but i have not seen this posted here.

A woman was hospitalized earlier this month with bubonic plague, the first confirmed human case in Los Angeles County in more than two decades, health officials said Tuesday.

The woman, who was not identified, was admitted April 13 with a fever, swollen lymph nodes and other symptoms. A blood test confirmed she had contracted the bacterial disease. The woman was placed on antibiotics and is in stable condition, officials said.

Bubonic plague is not contagious, but if left untreated it can morph into pneumonic plague, which can be spread from person to person. Bubonic plague is usually transmitted to humans from the bites of fleas infected by dead rodents.

Health officials suspect the woman was exposed to fleas in her central Los Angeles home, said Dr. Jonathan Fielding, the county's director of public health. The woman's family was also placed on antibiotics as a precaution, but there's no evidence they were infected.

The case is unusual because it occurred in an urban area, Fielding said. Most bubonic plague outbreaks happen in rural communities.

Health officials said there was no cause for panic because the disease is not easily transmissible.

This too could kill us now???? Maybe there are sprinkled cases of this i knew nothing about, but come on, this is too much.

Why bother to get up anymore in the mornings????

God help us.

come on dg, one flipping case. there is a huge outbreak of mumps all across the midwest....i'd be a little more worried about that than one case of BP in california.

I beg your pardon. Mumps?

Merely a childhood decease, although anyone can get it.

Bubonic plague is a tad different.

FYI Take a look at the Black Death:aka, bubonic Plague.

Black Death - Disaster Strikes
25 million people died in just under five years between 1347 and 1352. Estimated population of Europe from 1000 to 1352.
1000 38 million
1100 48 million
1200 59 million
1300 70 million
1347 75 million
1352 50 million


This is not good news.

its a normal occurance:

CDC Plague Home Page
Since then, human plague in the United States has occurred as mostly scattered cases in rural areas (an average of 10 to 15 persons each year). Globally, the World Health Organization reports 1,000 to 3,000 cases of plague every year.

mumps on the other hand:

Mumps outbreak concerns U.S. health officials

More than 600 people were reported sick in Iowa with the virus, once a common childhood illness but virtually eradicated with widespread use of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine.
It can sometimes cause more serious complications including meningitis, encephalisits, inflammation of the testicles or ovaries, inflammation of the pancreas and permanent deafness.

lets see, an average of 10 to 15 cases of BP per year, and right at the moment over 600 cases of mumps. oh, and the best part: you make it sound like BP is such a horrible thing and that the world is going to end because of this one case. guess what? BP mortality rate is a whopping 14%. so that means that in the US, on average a grand total of two people a year die of bubonic plague. oh my god, the skies going to fall!!!!!!

big whoop.






[edit on 18-4-2006 by snafu7700]

Originally posted by dgtempe

This too could kill us now???? Maybe there are sprinkled cases of this i knew nothing about, but come on, this is too much.

Why bother to get up anymore in the mornings????

dg, that's life. This stuff has always been there, even if you didn't know it. The only difference now is it's in your head. Forget about it.

Why bother to get up anymore?

come on. WHY NOT?

If you let stuff like this scare you there is no reason. the paranoia will get the best of you. like it or not, plenty of things have the potential to kill you each day, and bubonic plague isn't one of the main ones you should be concerned with.

Its pretty common esp. In animals actually



www.cdc.gov...

Well.....I stand corrected. Thank you for letting me know this is common, where have i been?

There is nothing to worry about with mumps either. Those symptoms you posted are "worse case scenarios" and we know how those can be.

I was a bit shocked also when I heard a woman talk about her experience with Bubonic Plague on C2C the other night.

She said her jaw swelled up and she had very bad flu like symptoms. She was quarantined for 4 days also.

Watch out for Bird Flu though!!!

Its going to mutate and getcha!!

The president has signed some wonderful papers on BIRD FLU Pandemic.

Costa Rica here I come.

Where are my car keys?.........

There was one last year I believe. In Texas. A family camped too close to prarie dogs which cary BP. It is a good thing she didnt let it go though. That I think is something to be worried about. If they think she got it from flees in her home, then others there or in the area could very well get it as well. All it takes to become pneumonic plague is for one person to not have health insurance and let it go.

I read up on it a few years ago when I read about a case for the first time. Most of the cases have been when people become too close to prarie dogs or other wild animals that cary it. I believe this case is a red flag, because they believe that the black plague started because of flees aslo. She is in LA the flees got it from an infected animal most likely a cat. That cat will spread it to the other cats, and more and more people will get infected via the fleas. For a person to come down with it in such a highly populated area by a flea is concerning to me. Granted they can stop it from turning to pneumonic by administering antibiotics, but lets face it, health insurance is a benifit that quite a few people just cant afford anymore. That on top of the rising health care costs, makes the fear of it turning into pnemonic plague and spreading like wild fire a very real threat.

[edit on 19-4-2006 by mrsdudara]

I was watching the news this morning when I heard about this story. The report stated that this was the first case of bubonic plague in over 20 years.

There was a TV documentary I can't recall which channel carried it, about recent research on the medieval black death. Circumspect evaluation of environmental details led the researchers to the conclusion that a flea vector was not involved, and that in spite of the facts that rats were involved and the signs and symptoms of the Black Death resemble modern bubonic plague (swollen glands, high fever, lung symptoms, etc.) that the Black Death was a completely different disease - not carried by a bacterial germ as is modern plague. The bacterium used to be called pasteurella pestis, but also called by another name named after the 19th century scientist who isolated it, can't remember his name. Instead the Black Death was caused by a virus unassociated with fleas according to the TV documentary.