Black Death - Recurrence - Third Plague Pandemic

Third Plague Pandemic

The Third plague pandemic (1855–1959) started in China in the middle of the 19th century, spreading to all inhabited continents and killing 10 million people in India alone. Twelve plague outbreaks in Australia between 1900 and 1925 resulted in well over 1000 deaths, mainly in Sydney. This led to the establishment of a Public Health Department there which undertook some leading-edge research on plague transmission from rat fleas to humans via the bacillus Yersinia pestis.

The first North American plague epidemic was the San Francisco plague of 1900–1904, followed by another outbreak in 1907–1908. From 1944 through 1993, 362 cases of human plague were reported in the United States; approximately 90% occurred in four western states: Arizona, California, Colorado, and New Mexico. Plague was confirmed in the United States from 9 western states during 1995. Currently, between 5 and 15 people in the United States are estimated to catch the disease each year, typically in western states.

The plague bacterium could develop drug-resistance and again become a major health threat. The ability to resist many of the antibiotics used against it has been found so far in only a single case of the disease in Madagascar, in 1995.