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At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1985

Nineteen cases of plague in Arizona. A spectrum including ecthyma gangrenosum due to plague and plague in pregnancy.

We review the cases of 19 successfully treated plague patients, with emphasis on the clinical and epidemiologic features of the disease. Proper staining and culturing of bubo aspirates; prompt institution of streptomycin, chloramphenicol or tetracycline therapy in presumptive cases, and supportive care are the crucial factors in the treatment of plague. This disease should be considered in patients in a toxic condition who have lymphadenitis, pneumonia or septic shock and who have been in endemic areas within the past ten days.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1993

[Epidemiology of the plague. Changes in the concept in research of infection chains since the discovery of the plague pathogen in 1894].

Three major plague epidemics have been recorded worldwide up to this day: the Justinian plague in the 6th century, the Black Death in the 14th century and the recent 20th century pandemic. The latter occurred at a time of advanced microbiological knowledge which permitted the etiology and the modes of transmission and spread of this bacterial infectious disease to be clarified. The present thesis is an attempt to describe the changes in plague research that occurred during that period of time. While the German, Austrian, British, Russian and Egyptian plague Commissions studying the Indian plague outbreak after 1896 contributed only little to the fundamental epidemiological knowledge on plague, several individual researchers succeeded in discovering some of the key facts in the etiology and transmission of the disease. Alexandre Yersin discovered the pathogenic agent of plague (Hongkong 1894), E.H. Hankin, P.L. Simond (Bombay 1898) and J.A. Thompson (Sydney 1900) recognized the role of rat plague, M. Ogata (Formosa 1897) and P.L. Simond (Bombay 1898) observed the transmission of the disease by fleas, and A.W. Bacot and C.J. Martin (1914) described the specific mechanism of transmission of plague. Accordingly, fleas transmit plague from rat to man, the efficiency of the flea as a vector depending on a blocking phenomenon specific of each flea species. The Indian rat flea (Xenopsylla cheopis) has been recognized the most efficient vector. Although the involvement of wild rodents was already known shortly after the turn of this century, the concept of sylvatic plague (the plague of wild rodents) as opposed to murine plague (the plague of commensal rodents) only emerged between 1920 and 1950. It led to taking stock of all hosts and vectors of the disease and thereby defining the natural foci of plague. According to this concept plague is primarily a disease of wild rodents which have been carrying it together with their fleas since ever. As man and urban rats only become infected occasionally, they do not constitute chronic foci. The occurrence of persistent foci rather depends on the interaction of resistant and sensitive wild rodents (burrowing animals) as was discovered by French researchers in the Middle East as late as the 1950s and 1960s. The concept of rodent-dependent transmission was somewhat attenuated by the discovery of direct interhuman transmission by French researchers between 1930 and 1965.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Animals↗
PubMed1983

Ecology of plague in Africa: response of indigenous wild rodents to experimental plague infection.

The Mastomys natalensis species complex, subdivided into genetically distinct species having diploid chromosome numbers 2n = 32 and 2n = 36, is a reservoir for several zoonoses including Lassa fever and plague. This report describes a study to determine whether these sibling species and three other rodent species have different potential as reservoirs for plague. It was found that M. natalensis (2n = 32) was significantly more resistant to experimental plague infection (50% survived inoculation with 120 000 Yersinia pseudotuberculosis subsp. pestis) than was M. coucha (2n = 36) (none of which survived doses of 190 Y. pseudotuberculosis subsp.pestis). In descending order of resistance were M. natalensis, Aethomys chrysophilus, M. coucha, Tatera leucogaster and A. namaquensis. No A. namaquensis survived inoculation of 10 or more plague bacilli.Previous reports on susceptibility to plague or other infections, which were based exclusively on findings in the universally distributed laboratory-bred Mastomys, are thus not necessarily applicable to the M. natalensis species as a whole but probably only to M. coucha. The Y. pseudotuberculosis subsp. pestis fraction-1 passive haemagglutination test appeared to be relatively insensitive in that only 5 out of 47 animals surviving experimental plague infection showed specific antibodies 6 weeks after challenge.The geographic distribution of human plague in southern Africa corresponds closely with that of the plague-susceptible species, M. coucha, while the resistant species, M. natalensis, predominates in areas where human plague has not been recorded. The role of A. namaquensis in the ecology of plague needs to be carefully studied and its possible importance in plague research should be investigated further.

Africa↗
PubMed1998

Plague that never was: a review of the alleged plague outbreaks in India in 1994.

Judging by WHO criteria, there was not a single case in India in 1994 that could be taken as a confirmed case of plague. Both clinical and epidemiological features of the illness alleged to be plague were not at all compatible with those of plague-both bubonic and pneumonic types. The bacteriologic and serological evidence was limited to a few cases, and doubtful. PCR is a highly sensitive test, but the specificity of PCR for plague was not verified under field conditions in India. Just by the demonstration of the presence of a causative organism in the environment or in the body tissue, one cannot substantiate occurrence of an infection or disease in man. In view of the assessment and review presented in this paper, one can conclude that the outbreaks of illness that resembled plague during late 1994 in Beed District and Surat were certainly not due to plague. If the Mamla outbreak had not been declared to be plague, the probability of the Surat illness being labeled as plague was negligible. Whatever happened provides a very important lesson of the harm that can occur nationally and globally from decisions based on inadequate or incorrect information.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

[Doxycycline in the prevention of experimental plague induced by plague microbe variants].

A comparative study was performed on the efficacy of doxycycline in experimental plague infection induced in albino mice by strain 231 of the plague microbe and its variant 231 Fra- deprived of the ability to produce the fraction I antigen. It was shown that the LD50 for strain 231 during animal treatment with doxycycline was significantly higher than that for variant 231 Fra-. Prophylaxis of the plague infection caused by the Fra- forms of the plague microbe required significantly higher doses of doxycycline (ED50) than that of the infection caused by the Fra+ forms. The use of the daily maximum permissible doses of doxycycline (50 to 100 mg/kg a day) for 10 days in treatment of albino mice infected with the strain Fra- did not provide animal survival at the level higher than 60 to 70 per cent while the survival rate in the animals infected with the strain Fra+ of the plague microbe and treated according to the same scheme amounted to 90-100 per cent. The lower therapeutic efficacy of doxycycline in the treatment of the infection caused by the fractionless variant of the plague microbe should be considered in development of rational schemes for prophylaxis and treatment of plague.

Animals↗
PubMed1976

Bubonic plague from exposure to a rabbit: a documented case, and a review of rabbit-associated plague cases in the United States.

A 62-year-old woman developed bubonic plague with an epitrochlear bubo one to two days after skinning two cottontail rabbits. The implicated rabbits were later recovered from the patient's freezer, and Yersinia pestis was isolated from marrows of both rabbits. Although human plague cases in the United States have occasionally been traced to exposure to wild rabbits, this is the first documentation of plague infection in the actual rabbits to which the patient was exposed. All reported cases of rabbit-associated plague in the United States were then reviewed. Eight cases were characterized by direct exposure to rabbit tissues. Seven of the eight cases occurred in adult males who had hunted rabbits during winter months in plague-endemic areas. These patients had upper extremity buboes, and the case-fatality ration for the group was 50%. Three other cases in which rabbit exposure was indirect or its role less clear, were also analyzed.

Animals↗
PubMedDate not supplied

[Is not plague a "protonosis"? (the role of Protozoa in the epizootiology of plague)].

The author expounds the idea that soil protozoa, whose vegetative forms and cysts can harbor the plague agent for fairly prolonged periods of time, can be a major player in the epizootiology of plague. It is also postulated that the symbiotic protozoa of the digestive tract of rodents and lagomorpha can also be a reservoir of the plague agent. If this is so, among apparent epizootic cycles in mammalians in wild plague foci one should look for Yersinia pestis in the protozoa from the burrows of their primary and secondary carriers. Because parasitism of bacteria in one-celled animals is essentially epizootic, plague epizootics are presumed to be a permanent process.

Amoeba↗
PubMed1975

Serological studies on human plague in Southern Africa. Part I. Plague antibody levels in a population during a quiescent and a subsequent active period in an endemic region.

Yersinia pestis fraction l passive haemagglutination studies on human sera obtained randomly during a plague epidemic showed a 10-fold increase in occurrence of antibodies compared with the results obtained on sera from the same population 11 months earlier during a quiescent phase. The pre-epidemic population antibody rate was lower than that in a comparable population tested simultaneously in another endemic region, where a recrudescence of plague was not experienced during the following year. The human plague epidemic was preceded and accompanied by a rodent die-off. A serological survey of the small mammals 2 years prior to the human survey also showed that Y. pestis was present in the environment. Otomys unisulcatus was indicated as being an important rodent in the plague cycle in the area.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1984

[Effectiveness of revaccinating hamadryas baboons with NISS live dried plague vaccine and fraction I of the plague microbe].

The effectiveness of some vaccine preparations for the revaccination of hamadryas baboons after their primary immunization with live plague vaccine " NIIS " administered in the form of aerosol was studied. The study was carried out under the conditions of the aerosol challenge of the animals with Y. pestis. The subcutaneous injection of plague vaccine " NIIS " was found to have advantages over its aerosol administration. Revaccination with Y. pestis fraction I, absorbed, was found to be 8 times more effective than the administration of plague vaccine " NIIS " by inhalation and not inferior to the subcutaneous injection of this vaccine. Y. pestis lipopolysaccharide, when injected simultaneously with fraction I, produced an immunosuppressive effect. The development of chemical plague vaccine on the basis of fraction I, intended for revaccination, was shown to have good prospects.

Aerosols↗
PubMed1997

[A study on the transmission of plague though seven kinds of fleas in rat type and wild rodent type plague foci in Yunnan].

In order to assess vector position and vector action of seven kinds of fleas in the rat type and wild rodent type plague foci in Yunnan, we studied the indices as: infection rate, rate of feed bacterial emboli, colony transmission vector efficiency, life-span, bloodthirsty to human, body weight, quantity of blood-sucking, rate of dissociation by using animal model and raise film method. The results showed that Xenopsylla cheopis and Neopsylla specialis specialis were the main vectors of two type plague foci. Pulex irritans was an important vector of human plague in Yunnan. This paper reported that Xenopsylla cheopis and Neopsylla special special could twice form bacterial emboli, and with other information about vector efficiency, Index of Pulex irritans, Neopsylla special special, Frontopsylla spadix, Monopsyllus anisus, rate of bloodthirsty to human and life-span of seven kinds of fleas. Reason from quiescence to resuscitate was also deduced and the vector position of Leptopsylla segnis was revised. The vector action of main vector for Ctenophalmus quadratus was negated which proved that Apodemus chevrieri was the main reservoirs in these plague foci.

Animals↗
PubMed1999

[Comparative study of the ideas about causes, disease mechanisms and therapies of the plague on the basis of the plague treatises of the Medical Faculty of Paris (1348-1349), of Joannes de Vesalia (after 1454) and of Thomas Montanus (1669)].

The comparison between the consilium of the Faculty of Paris (14th century), and the treatises by Joannes de Vesalia (15th century) and by Thomas Montanus (17th century) shows that the concepts with regard to the causes and the mechanisms of and the proposed preventive and curative measures against the plague did in essence not change for over three centuries. In fact this is not very surprising, since the development of modern physiology and physiopathology only started gradually in the second half of the 19th century. Furthermore, the plague bacillus has only been identified in 1894. However, the preventive and curative measures against plague that are proposed in the three treatises, do not result from an uncontrolled imagination. Most of these measures have a rational basis and are the result of--although erroneous--concepts with regard to the causes and mechanisms of the disease.

Education, Medical↗
PubMedDate not supplied

[Functional phenotypic variability in a plague pathogen and plague enzootics].

In the bacterial population, phenotypic variability plays a part of structural and functional subsystem that occupies a special place in the relations of heterogenic populations by performing an important adaptive function in the common system of ecological connections of parasitocenosis. At the same time regularly varying microorganism phenotypes act as an independent system that are closely related with the conditions of the niches occupied by the causative agent. Each subsystem as part of parasitocenosis is provided by its intrinsic adaptive mechanisms, which in combination ensures the stability of biocenosis based on self-regulation of evolutionarily established ecosystems. With the total complexity of parasitocenosis, the causative agent of plague is essential in forming its focus. For objective analysis of an epizootic process, it is necessary to include the established mechanisms of phenotypic variability of the causative agent of plague as a key link of the structural and functional interaction ecosystem that determines the mechanism of plague entozootics.

Animal Diseases↗