In a follow-up to a earlier report about a single case of bubonic plague in a northwestern province, it is reported that the town of Yumen as been “sealed off”, causing the quarantine of some 30,000 people.
The case was a 38-year-old man who contracted the lethal bacterial disease after contact with a marmot.
In the US, we have seen several bubonic plague cases this year in New Mexico and Colorado and the reaction was much more reserved. It begs to question, “Why such a dramatic response to a bubonic plague case?”
Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine and infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville wonders the same thing. In a excellent report in Live Science today, Schaffner said, “I feel there’s something here that we don’t know, because this seems a very expansive response to just one case. We have cases of bubonic plague from time to time in the United States, and they don’t require this kind of public health response,” Schaffner said.
“I’m very puzzled at the circumstances here, and what the actual hazard is,” Schaffner said. For more infectious disease news and information, visit and “like” the Infectious Disease News Facebook page
