Joran's SF Page

Joran's SF Page - Amber

A_EVE.HTM

AMBER
The one true world. All others, including our Earth, are merely Shadows...

Events

Index:
Black Death
Bubonic Plague
Corwin's car accident
Pattern Fall
Rescue of Brand

Black Death

An epidemic which occurred in Europe in 1400 AD. Killed about 75 million people.

See Bubonic Plague.

See also: Corwin Eric Earth Bubonic Plague

Bubonic Plague [bue-bahn'-ik]

Bubonic plague is an acute infection in humans and various species of rodents, cased by Yersinia pestis (formally called Pasteurella pestis), a bacterium transmitted by fleas that have fed on infected rodents. After a flea has fed on blood from the skin of an infected rodent, usually a rat, the ingested plague bacteria multiply in the flea's upper digestive tract and eventually obstruct it. Then, when the flea feeds again, on a human or another rodent, the obstruction causes the freshly ingested blood to be regurgitated back into the bite, along with plague bacteria. The circulatory system of the bitten individual then carries the bacteria throughout the body.

The first signs of illness in humans appear suddenly, within about a week. In a few hours the body temperature rises to about 40°C (104°F), and the victim becomes gravely ill, experiencing vomiting, muscular pain, mental disorganization, and delirium. The lymph nodes throughout the body, especially those in the groin and the thighs, become enlarged and extremely painful. The inflamed lymph nodes, called buboes (from which the disease gets its name), become filled with pus, and the disease spreads through the body by way of the infected bloodstream and the lymphatic system. In 60-90 percent of the untreated cases, death occurs within a few days.

Plague pneumonia, or pneumonic plague, is caused by the same bacteria as bubonic plague but is acquired by inhaling infected droplets from the lungs of someone whose plague infection has spread to the respiratory system. This is the most contagious form of the disease and the form that progresses most rapidly, with death usually occurring in less than three days in virtually all untreated cases.

Historic Epidemics. Respiratory transmission was mainly responsible for the historical plague epidemics that swept across entire continents and wiped out tens of millions of people. One such epidemic killed an estimated 100 million people in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia during the 6th century. Another epidemic in the same regions during the 14th century--known as the Black Death--killed one-fourth to one-half the population of Europe, or about 75 million people. Epidemics of that magnitude have not occurred in modern times.

Small epidemics of bubonic plague continue to occur in widespread regions of the world, including the United States. The epidemics fail to spread beyond local outbreaks, however, which may suggest that less virulent strains of the plague bacterium have developed over the years and conferred a relative immunity to many people. That plague does recur indicates its existence as a chronic disease in populations of wild rodents.

Prevention. The most effective way to prevent plague is to reduce the rodent and flea populations by the use of proper sanitation and rodenticides and insecticides. The plague organism is vulnerable to the antibiotics streptomycin, chloramphenicol, and tetracycline, if treatment is started within about 15 hours of the first appearance of symptoms