A PERSON in the US could have caught the bubonic plague from a house cat, health officials have warned.
The unnamed victim is Oregon‘s first cause of the deadly medieval disease in eight years.
CorbisSymptoms of the plague include pus-filled boils[/caption]
Dr Richard Fawcett, the state health officer, told NBC News the patient who caught the nasty bug became “very sick”.
Usually, an infection of this kind starts with flu-like symptoms, including fatigue, fever, chills, and a headache.
Sufferers will develop abdominal pain, diarrhoea and vomiting, and some people will bleed from their mouths, noses or rectums.
The recent infection, however, had progressed to the point of draining pus-filled boils, called a “bubo”, which is a rare outcome nowadays.
The patient has since been treated with antibiotics, to which they are responding well.
Their close contacts have also been treated to curb the possibility of further spread.
The infectious bacterial disease is carried by wild rodents and their fleas.
Officials have not said how the infection spread from the cat to the owner, but if the cat was bitten by infected fleas, the pet might have brought the infection or fleas home, exposing the owner, too.
Alternatively, the owner may have been in contact with the cat’s contaminated fluids.
Cats are particularly susceptible to plague because their bodies have a hard time clearing the infection, and they’re more likely than some other pets to chase and capture rodents that carry infected fleas.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates there are between 1,000 and 2,000 cases of plague around the world every year.
The disease is easily treatable with modern medicine – but left untreated, most infected will die within a week.
In the 14th Century, the black death – a collection of plagues including bubonic plague – tore through the globe, making it the most deadly recorded pandemic in history.
It killed 200million people across Africa, Asia and Europe, wiping out 60 per cent of Europe’s population in its path.
Though many believe the medieval disease is long gone, countries around the world still suffer deadly outbreaks of the bubonic plague due to animals carrying the bacteria.
The plague has been reported in the United States, Peru, China, Bolivia, Uganda, Tanzania and Russia.
NHS Fit to Travel advises travellers to practice using insect repellents when near nature and avoid any close contact with sick or dead animals and crowded areas where plague has recently been reported.
GettyCountries around the world still suffer deadly outbreaks of the bubonic plague due to animals carrying the bacteria[/caption]
History of the Black Death
THE Black Death was an epidemic of bubonic plague which struck Europe and Asia in the 1300s.
It killed more than 20 million people in Europe.
Scientists now know the plague was spread by a bacillus known as yersina pestis.
The bacteria can travel through the air as well as through the bites of infected fleas and rats.
Bubonic plague can cause swelling of the lymph nodes. If untreated, it could spread to the blood and lungs.
Other symptoms included fever, vomiting and chills.
Physicians relied on treatments such as boil-lancing to bathing in vinegar as they tried to treat people with the plague.
Some believed that the Black Death was a “divine punishment” – a form of retribution for sins against God
GettyCats are particularly susceptible to plague because their bodies have a hard time clearing the infection[/caption]