China has reported the fourth case of a pest infection within a few weeks. The state news agency Xinhua reported that authorities confirmed the illness of a man in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. The shepherd infected with the bubonic plague and is treated in a hospital.
Already on 16 November, a man in the northern Chinese region was ill with the bubonic plague. Before that, the authorities reported two patients with pulmonary plague, also from Inner Mongolia, but treated in the capital, Beijing.
In China, there are always isolated infections with pest-pathogens. From 2009 to September 2019, according to state media, 27 people were affected by various forms of the plague - 12 of them died.
The state newspaper Global Times reported that the man was infected with bubonic plague after eating the meat of a wild hare. He will recover now. The people with whom he was previously in contact were also investigated, but have since been released.
People should stay away from wild animals
The authorities are now taking measures to prevent further spread. In an area of 133 square kilometers, helicopters sprayed rat poison in Inner Mongolia. Among other things, the bacterium Yersinia pestis can be transmitted from rats via fleas to humans.
Chinese health experts said the plague could be controlled if people kept away from wild animals that could carry the bacterium. There were also training sessions for medical workers in the affected regions.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there are many cases of plague in various countries. From 2010 to 2015, the organization counted 3,248 people worldwide, 584 of whom died. There was a big outbreak in Madagascar in 2017 with several thousand confirmed cases, more than 200 people died.