Plague (cont.)
Septicemic plague
This form of plague occurs when the bacteria multiply in
the blood.
How do you get it?
You usually get septicemic plague the same way as bubonic
plague—through a flea or rodent bite. You can also get septicemic plague if you
had untreated bubonic or pneumonic plague.
What are the symptoms?
Symptoms include fever, chills, weakness, abdominal
pain, shock, and bleeding underneath the skin or other organs. Buboes, however,
do not develop.
Is it contagious?
Septicemic plague is rarely spread from person to person.
Pneumonic plague
This is the most serious form of plague and occurs when Y. pestis bacteria infect the lungs and cause pneumonia.
How do you get it?
You get primary pneumonic plague when you inhale plague
bacteria from an infected person or animal. You usually have to be in direct or
close contact with the ill person or animal. You get secondary pneumonic plague
if you have untreated bubonic or septicemic plague that spreads to your lungs.
What are the symptoms?
Symptoms usually develop within 1 to 3 days after you are
exposed to airborne droplets of plague bacteria. Pneumonia begins quickly, with
shortness of breath, chest pain, cough, and sometimes bloody or watery sputum.
Other symptoms include fever, headache, and weakness.
Is it contagious?
Pneumonic plague is contagious. If someone has pneumonic
plague and coughs, droplets containing Y. pestis bacteria from their lungs are
released into the air. An uninfected person can then develop pneumonic plague by
breathing in those droplets.
Transmission
Y. pestis is found in animals throughout the world, most commonly in rats but
occasionally in other wild animals, such as prairie dogs. Most cases of human
plague are caused by bites of infected animals or the infected fleas that feed
on them. In almost all cases, only the pneumonic form of plague (see Forms of
Plague) can be passed from person to person.
Diagnosis
A health care provider can diagnose plague by doing laboratory tests on blood
or sputum, or on fluid from a lymph node.
Treatment
When plague is suspected and diagnosed early, a health care provider can
prescribe specific antibiotics (generally streptomycin or gentamycin). Certain
other antibiotics are also effective.
Left untreated, bubonic plague bacteria can quickly multiply in the
bloodstream, causing septicemic plague, or even progress to the lungs, causing
pneumonic plague.
Next: Can plague be prevented with a vaccine? »
- Pneumonia - Learn pneumonia symptoms, causes, treatment, signs, diagnosis and types: viral and bacterial (Pneumocystis carinii, Klebsiella, Mycoplasma, Chlamydia pneumoniae).
- Abdominal Pain - Learn about abdominal pain (pain in the stomach / abdomen) including causes, symptoms, how abdominal pain is diagnosed, and how abdominal pain is treated.
- Headache - Learn about the different types of headaches, migraine, tension, cluster, menstrual, and spinal headaches; and their causes, symptoms, diagnosis and treatment.
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