A Northeastern University public health expert says the recent death of an Arizona resident from pneumonic plague underscores the severity of the rare disease as well as the need to seek treatment right away.
There are three types of plague, bubonic, septicemic and pneumonic. The Arizona victim had the more fatal pneumonic type, says Neil Maniar, director of Northeastern’s master of public health program.
The most deadly type
The bubonic type, the more common type of plague named for the buboes or swollen lymph nodes experienced by sufferers, can be very severe with a case fatality ratio of 30% to 60%, according to the World Health Organization.
But the pneumonic type is nearly always fatal when left untreated, WHO says. The good news, Maniar says, “is today we have a way, with very effective antibiotics, to treat it.”
