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Bubonic Plague Research Paper

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Bubonic plague is an infectious disease that is spread by the bacteria Yersinia pestis. These bacteria remain in a dormant state primarily in a rat flea’s foregut. Once the flea has bitten a victim it regurgitates the contents in its foregut into the bite location. Once the bacterium has entered into a mammal’s warm body it begins to reproduce and spread throughout the mammal’s body. The reproduction of this bacterium creates large painful swollen lymph nodes which are called buboes. Once these buboes get large enough they begin to ooze infected body fluid so that any contact between an infected person and a healthy person will facilitate the spread of this disease. (The Mayo Clinic Staff, 2012)
The areas where the buboes form are the …show more content…

(The Mayo Clinic Staff, 2012)
It was believed in the middle ages that this disease was caused by poor hygiene, bad eating habits, corrupted humid air, and a lack of rest. Once a person was thought to be infected the doctors would move them to a non-infected area thinking that this would heal the persons illness instead this transported the disease even further than normal. In modern times we have made leaps and bounds to control this illness. One of the main problems of the plague is that it is not treatable until the victim gets tested and confirmed that the plague is the illness. Once that is done they will start receiving high doxycycline doses and many other types of antibiotics. The mortality rate for someone that is not treated is 50-90% compared to treated cases of 1-15%.
The bubonic plague has been around for almost two thousand years. In most early cases the plague was spread from China along the Silk Road. The Silk Road was the over land trade route from the orient that silk, spices, and other trade able goods from the east to western Europe. In most cases rats carrying the Oriental Rat Flea or another animal carrying the flea would move to a new location. Once that animal died the flea would move to another host which could be a human. Once bitten by the flea a bubo begins to form when the bubo begins to ooze fluid the illness can then be passed through touch. As stated above in the Middle

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