Plague Is Diagnosed in China, Prompting Fears of an Outbreak

BEIJING — Two people in China were diagnosed with plague, setting off a panic Tuesday about the potential spread of the highly infectious and fatal disease and prompting China’s government to warn citizens to take precautions to protect themselves.

Pneumonic plague is one of three types of infectious disease known as plague caused by the same bacterium, Yersinia pestis. Patients diagnosed with pneumonic plague, which causes high fevers and shortness of breath, sometimes first contract the closely related and more well-known disease, bubonic plague.

Li Jifeng, a doctor at Beijing Chaoyang Hospital where the two people sought treatment, wrote on WeChat, a social media platform, that the patients sought treatment Nov. 3. That post, which has since been deleted, was published by CN-Healthcare, a website that covers health care news in China. Li could not be reached for comment and Beijing Chaoyang Hospital declined to comment.

On why authorities took so long to make the announcement, Li wrote that signs of any infectious disease need to be repeatedly verified and investigated, and such announcements cannot be “transmitted casually.” Skeptical Chinese internet users have charged the government with being slow to disclose news about the disease, which is transmitted between humans and kills even faster than the more-common bubonic form. China has a history of covering up and being slow to announce infectious outbreaks, prompting many people to call for transparency this time.

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