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| Africa: North |
| Algeria hit by plague outbreak |
| 2003-07-11 |
| Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse. EFL: UN health officials are helping Algeria to investigate an outbreak of plague in the west of the country which has claimed at least one life. A team from the World Health Organization and other international bodies went to the Oran region after reports of plague emerged last month. Algeria’s health ministry has announced 10 laboratory-confirmed cases to date and one probable case. France, the former colonial power (snicker) which has a large ethnic Algerian community, has tightened sanitary controls at its ports to guard against contaminated rats and insects. As opposed to their domestic rats and bugs. The WHO said preliminary studies had been carried out but more work was needed to establish the source of the plague which has taken both bubonic and septicaemic forms. Of the 10 confirmed cases, eight were of bubonic plague and two of the deadlier septicaemic kind, one of which proved fatal. Deadlier than bubonic plague? The French health ministry said in a recent report that no cases of plague had surfaced in France itself but it was taking precautions at ports. It also reminded travellers to take greater precautions if visiting areas with a plague risk. Visit beautiful Algeria. Come for the terrorists, stay for the plague! |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #6 France, the former colonial power (snicker) which has a large ethnic Algerian community, has tightened sanitary controls at its ports to guard against contaminated rats and insects. In all seriousness, it's a major concern for the Linchpin in the Axis of Weasels. A lot of the cargo shipments between France and Algeria are done by sea. There are not many air links into Algeria (Air France only resumed flights back into the country a few weeks back). |
| Posted by: Pappy 2003-7-11 1:06:49 PM |
| #5 We have cases in the western U.S. all the time. Good antibiotic treatment available. Rarely have deaths in the U.S. As anthrax and SARS have proven, medicine in the U.S.A. is pretty good. Zero SARS deaths, and an anthrax death rate well below predictions. |
| Posted by: Chuck 2003-7-11 10:31:29 AM |
| #4 Plague: spread mainly through rat fleas Bubonic: fatal around 50% of the time, travels through the lymph system. Black plague responsible for the big extermination just prior to Defoe's era (he was just a little kid too young to remember). Pneumonic: Most deadly. Attacks pulmonary, lung system. Almost 100% fatal. Spread via aerosol human-human not from rat fleas. Outbreaks burn out quickly as all victims die. Septicaemic: spread by rat fleas. Symptoms within hours, death within days. |
| Posted by: Anon1 2003-7-11 10:22:41 AM |
| #3 A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe |
| Posted by: mojo 2003-7-11 9:59:57 AM |
| #2 "...the Oran region after reports of plague emerged last month." Somebody notify Monsier Hugo!... |
| Posted by: mojo 2003-7-11 9:32:06 AM |
| #1 My recollection is that the plague can take three forms: bubonic, pneumonic(?) and septicaemic. The last being the worst. With septicaemic, everything just kind of shuts down, all at the same time. |
| Posted by: Anonymous 2003-7-11 9:28:48 AM |