Max Whittaker-Reuters A sign on the edge of Yosemite National Park, Calif., is surrounded by a burn from the Rim Fire on August 23, 2013.
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The Bubonic plague is commonly carried by small rodents such as squirrels and chipmunks – and their fleas. Previously, park’s Crane Flat campground had been shut and opened on Friday. Health officials say no other people who were camping with the child became sick.
As per the department, over the past two weeks, the plague has been detected in wild rodents at Crane Flat and Tuolumne Meadows campgrounds in Yosemite; however, the threat to human health is low.
Park visitors are being given information on how to remain safe. The child has been recovering in a hospital. Both lethal Colorado cases are believed to have been of the septicemic variety.
Medicine has come a long way since then, with antibiotics and antimicrobial medicines among the tools to aid those with the plague. According to the Centers for Disease Control, plague symptoms include high fever, chills, weakness and swollen lymph nodes. But it hasn’t eliminated the disease entirely, including in developed countries like the United States.
CDPH Director Karen Smith said the department had been notified of a presumptive positive case of plague in a person visiting California from Georgia. Of course, earlier this month, a girl in Los Angeles had also been diagnosed with the condition, and since it is already rare to see this disease in humans, it would be a good idea to get tested.
Earlier this year, a Colorado teen also died from the centuries-old scourge, and last year four people in the state were sickened after coming into contact with an infected dog, officials said. Animals infected with the plague are usually found in the mountains or foothills but can sometimes be found along the California coast.
There are typically about seven cases of plague reported annually in the U.S.
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Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University Medical School, said a key component of staying safe while camping is using bug spray and doing everything possible to keep rodents out of a campsite.
