Pneumonic Plague in Madagascar

It looks like patient zero of this particular outbreak died back in August:

The initial patient died in a taxi on August 28, trying to reach Tamatave.

While on transit, two passengers came into contact with him, and died of the infection less than 24 hours later in Antananarivo.

Five die of pneumonic plague in Madagascar

I read in one of the ancillary articles that Madagascar has had an outbreak of the plague every year for the past number of years.

a reply to: ketsuko

Hopefully, it's not antibiotic resistant, else it should be rather treatable in this day of age.

Chloramphenicol and Streptomycin being the most effective means of treatment.

a reply to: ketsuko

LoLz! Seriously? Me. Freaking pets traveling internationally even have to be quarantined to some degree. And certain imports. Why not people of certain geographic areas who have been exposed to deadly pathogens?

a reply to: Baddogma

Man, what a bummer.

"If they are travelling shorter distances and they're still in the incubation period, and they have the pneumonic (form) then they could spread it to other places. "We don't want to have a situation where the disease spreads so fast it sort of gets out of control."

Dr Chopra added that it spreads "very rapidly", as seen by the number of cases in Madagascar doubling within a week. Speaking from Madagascar, Christine South, head of IFRC's emergency operations, said: "With anything like this there is a possibility that somebody could be infected and get on a plane. "We have done preparedness support to some of the neighbouring countries." However, she added that she believed the plague outbreak may now be stabilising but medical staff would have a clearer understand of this over the next few days.

Texas Uni Dr Chopra . Not much data
on spread from wiki . What does he mean by 'sort of' gets out of control . If it reaches further countries could mean serious trouble bug out time . Till then , wait and see

news.com.au

originally posted by: kosmicjack
a reply to: ketsuko

LoLz! Seriously? Me. Freaking pets traveling internationally even have to be quarantined to some degree. And certain imports. Why not people of certain geographic areas who have been exposed to deadly pathogens?

I'm just telling you the same thing we were all told when they were trying to get people who came back from Africa to voluntarily quarantine themselves for 21 days. How dare that even be suggested?! It was like it was an outrage.

As it happens, I think such things are sensible and think any sane and responsible person should put themselves under a quarantine. This one pops up faster then Ebola does thankfully.

What we're interested in is the reproductive # (R0), this is the number of individuals each infected person can further infect.

According to the estimates, the basic reproduction number, R0, was on the order of 2.8 to 3.5, which is higher than previous estimates. The lower 95% confidence intervals of R0 exceeded unity. The effective reproduction number declined below unity after control measures were introduced in Mukden, and before the official implementation in Madagascar.

Transmission potential of primary pneumonic plague: time inhomogeneous evaluation based on historical documents of the transmission network

This study shows that each infected individual will go on to infect an additional 2.8 - 3.5 people. As long as it can be gotten ahead of, it can be easily controlled. The issue is if it gets a foothold and is not recognized early enough, it can spread pretty quickly according to this.

There is plenty of info about transmission here.

academic.oup.com...

even people living in the same houses don't necessarily catch it from each other as the research states.

People seem to get worried because this is obviously a deadly disease when caught but that doesn't mean it gets passed round that easily. This happened with the Ebola scare, the media in a frenzy and people convinced it would be spread like wildfire through plane travel. .......it didn't, just as the various studies said it was unlikely.

originally posted by: kosmicjack
I don't understand why quarantine isn't used more often? Particularly in this case? It just seems like we've been lucky so far is all...

big money is involved I suppose

Gawd - the ignorance in this thread is astounding...

wwwnc.cdc.gov...

Instead of endless speculation why don't you educate your self from real sources.

mg.usembassy.gov...

Apparently - once you look into the facts - Madagascar has an outbreak of plague every year.


One might think people don't know how to use the internet ...

ecdc.europa.eu...

Be use to throw out your Madagascaran Vanilla....

a reply to: FyreByrd

There is an outbreak of plague, yes, but usually it remains bubonic, not pneumonic.

Pneumonic kills faster and also can be spread through the air instead of relying on animal vectors. That makes it a slightly bigger threat. You have a version that is more easily transmissible because it can pass directly from person to person and harder to treat because the window of time for effective treatment is much smaller.

For the record, I am hardly panicked. It hasn't gone anywhere beyond Madagascar yet, but it is something to keep an eye on ... like ebola was.

a reply to: TobyFlenderson

Man, what a bummer.

And that was me on a good day! I can clear a party in ten minutes when depressed.

Oh, that reminds me... I left out super volcanoes and sun storms, in my list of mass deadly fears.

AND time... kills everything!

a reply to: Baddogma

fyrebyrd they usually get bubonic plague...this year it is pneumatic (in the lungs) it is easier to pass......we should keep an eye on this story

insane practice of digging up family corpses and parading them around

www.express.co.uk...

The ancient ritual of 'famadihanaf, or turning of the bones, sees relatives dig up their dead loved ones, have the deceased’s body rewrapped and paraded through the streets while dancing iwith them.

And the macabre ritual is now being blamed for the rise and spread of BLACK DEATH plague across the nation.

oh...gosh. these people have no idea what they're doing

a reply to: ElGoobero

worse news.....it is about to hit africa where it will be difficult to control www.dailymail.co.uk...

the plague is at a crisis point in Madagascar...and is about to hit Africa...this outbreak is described as trhe WORST in 50 years...plague cases spiraled 40 per cent in one week

the world bank released an extra 5 million to help control this outbreak