Showing papers on "Plague (disease) published in 1980"

Tuberculosis in the 1980s.

Abstract: MEDICAL and social progress often alter the distribution and impact of a disease. There is perhaps no disease of which this is truer than tuberculosis. The "white plague" of centuries past has beco...

The disappearance of plague: a continuing puzzle.

Abstract: T THE most feared disease in early modern England was plague. Before its disappearance from England in i666,2 plague had for centuries been a dreaded visitor to the larger towns and cities of the kingdom. When an epidemic broke out in a city like London, the entire tenor of life changed. Many of the better-off inhabitants fled to the country to escape infection; commerce and industry stagnated; the usually teeming streets were empty. During the great London epidemic of i665, Samuel Pepys lamented, "Lord, what a sad time it is, to see no boats upon the River-and grass grow all up and down Whitehall-court-and nobody but poor wretches in the streets."3 As if to celebrate the relentless advance of death, the bells of the parish churches rang out at each death and each burial. To contemporaries, it seemed that God was venting his wrath on a sinful mankind. In London and other great urban concentrations of Europe, the loss of life from plague was terrible. According to the Bills of Mortality, 70,594 persons died of plague in London during the epidemic of I 665-6. The actual figure was higher, because many plague deaths were mistakenly attributed to other diseases, and it has been estimated that this one epidemic claimed 8o,ooo victims, out of a total

Plague studies in California--The roles of various species of sylvatic rodents in plague ecology in California

Abstract: Author(s): Nelson, Bernard C. | Abstract: The status of our knowledge of the roles of various sylvatic rodents in plague ecology in California is reviewed. Two theories, Pavlovsky's doctrine of focality of zoonotic diseases and Baltazard's proposal that plague is maintained in nature in resistant rodent species, form the framework for our understanding of the occurrence and persistence of plague. The concepts of resistance, reservoir species, susceptibility, and recipient species are defined and discussed. The ecological attributes that appear to enhance the role of certain rodent species as reservoirs are proposed, and the ecological features that appear to produce epizootics are briefly outlined. Based on current information, the roles of individual species of rodents, rabbits, and some insectivores are presented and discussed in relation to epizootic potential and the epidemiology of human infection. Man's role in plague ecology leading to greater exposure to sylvatic plague is emphasized.

The great plague of Athens.

Abstract: Apres avoir rejete l'idee que la peste d'Athenes (Vs. av. J.-C.) soit un artifice litteraire de Thucydide, l'A. montre que toutes les tentatives modernes d'identification de la maladie posent des problemes, bien que la verole soit la possibilite la moins improbable J. Shrewsbury, D. L. Page, H. Zinsser, R. J. et M. L. Littman, B. Ebbell.

The Effect of the Black Death on English Higher Education

Abstract: The effect of plague on fourteenth-century education is not a neglected topic.* While there may be no recent thesis on the relationship similar to the provocative but controversial work by Millard Meiss on the effect of the Black Death on Florentine and Sienese art,' many scholars have noted a decline or at least a period of quiescence at various medieval universities in the decades immediately after 1348, a change often attributed to the Black Death. The only general work devoted to this important subject remains Anna Campbell's The Black Death and Men of Learning, which surveys most of the information available a half century ago.2 Since then, some work has bee;n done on the relation of plague to elementary and secondary education,3 but despite the appearance of additional quantitative evidence on medieval universities, little that is new has appeared on the relation of plague and higher education either in England or on the Continent. The lack of any useful or extensive quantitative data in the earlier part of this century led to widely differing opinions and a tendency to base conclusions on subjective or vague contemporary statements that at best gave an impressionistic assessment of the situation. In the absence of other types of evidence, Campbell placed considerable emphasis on statements by contemporary scholars, or similar pronouncements culled from foundation charters of universities and colleges established between 1350 and 1380, bemoaning the contemporary decline in education, either numerically or qualitatively, and sometimes both. Notwithstanding the fact that many of these statements have a formulaic ring, especially those in foundation charters, and the fact that the supposed decline was as frequently blamed on warfare, the mendicants, the monks, or some other cause as on plague and population decline, Campbell felt that most of this material was evidence for the. severity of the Black Death on education. Even where Campbell used statistical data, such

Shakespeare: The Poet in His World

Abstract: The world he found 1 The cradle of security 2 A challenge to fortune 3 The upstart crow 4 The poet of the plague years The world he made 5 The poet of love 6 The Lord Chamberlain's Men 7 Enter, fighting, at several doors 8 Hamlet, revenge! 9 'His Majesty's poor players' 10 The Kingdom of fools The world and the dream 11 The dream of ancient lands 12 The end of the revels

Recommendations for the control of Yersinia pestis infections. Recommendations from the CDC.

Abstract: Yersinia pestis, the etiologic agent of plague, is endemic in the western United States; 105 cases were reported between 1970 and 1979. Plague may manifest in one of three clinical forms; bubonic, septicemic, or pneumonic. Bubonic and septicemic plague represent relatively little risk for human-to-human transmission to contacts, although heavily infected secretions, such as drainage from a bubo, pose a theoretical risk, especially if they are aerosolized from a syringe during diagnohree clinical forms; bubonic, septicemic, or penumonic. Bubonic and septicemic plague represent relatively little risk for human-to-human transmission to contacts, although heavily infected secretions, such as drainage from a bubo, pose a theoretical risk, especially if they are aerosolized from a syringe during diagnohree clinical forms; bubonic, septicemic, or penumonic. Bubonic and septicemic plague represent relatively little risk for human-to-human transmission to contacts, although heavily infected secretions, such as drainage from a bubo, pose a theoretical risk, especially if they are aerosolized from a syringe during diagnostic aspirations. Pneumonic plague may be highly contagious to contacts and poses a greater risk. The Plague Branch, Center for Disease Control recommends that all patients with plague be placed in strict isolation for the first 48 hours of treatment because of the possibility that pneumonia may supervene. If it does not, wound and skin precautions are adequate for the duration of hospitalization. Untreated plague pneumonia is an epidemiologic emergency. All contacts must be identified promptly and those with face-to-face exposure should receive abortive antibiotic therapy. All contacts should be under surveillance, with twice-daily temperature checks, for seven days.

Discovery of a new focus of zoonotic plague in the eastern Azarbaidjan region of Iran

Abstract: The surveillance of territories surrounding the plague focus of Kurdistan province in Iran, by inspection of wild rodent burrows, permit to reveal the existence of an epizootic in a new focus located in the Eastern Azarbaidjan province, where plague was never reported. 14 strains of Y. pestis were isolated from Meriones vinogradovi, M. persicus Mesocricetus brandti and from the fleas: Xenopsylla conformis and Nosopsylla iranus iranus. The eventual relationship between these two areas separated by about 200 km was investigated: neither attempts to isolate Y. pestis nor serological surveys permit to reveal any sign of plague enzootic in the zone between the Kurdistan focus and the new described focus of the Eastern Azarbaidjan.

Probabilities and Causes: On Life Tables, Causes of Death, and Etiological Diagnoses

Abstract: Causes of death began to be recorded by London parishes as early as 1592: “the occasion of keeping an accompt of burials arose first from the plague”, said John Graunt [1662, §1]. From 1629 on, the London Bills of Mortality gave detailed weekly returns of diseases and casualties enumerated in alphabetical order (lists of 60 to 70 causes). The registration of causes of every person’s death became mandatory in England under the 1837 Registration Act.

Plague in Central Java, Indonesia.

Abstract: Plague in man occurred from 1968 to 1970 in mountain villages of the Boyolali Regency in Central Java. Infected fleas, infected rats, and seropositive rats were collected in villages with human plague cases. Subsequent isolations of Yersinia pestis and seropositive rodents, detected during investigations of rodent plague undertaken by the Government of Indonesia and the WHO, attested to the persistence of plague in the region from 1972 to 1974. Since 1968, the incidence of both rodent and human plague has been greatest from December to May at elevations over 1000 m. Isolations of Y. pestis were obtained from the fleas Xenopsylla cheopis and Stivalius cognatus and the rats Rattus rattus diardii and R. exulans ephippium. The major risk to man has been fleas infected with Y. pestis of unique electrophoretic phenotype. Infected fleas were collected most often in houses. Introduced in 1920, rodent plague had persisted in the Boyolali Regency for at least 54 years. The recent data support specific requirements for continued plague surveillance.

Seasonality of Plague in Early Modern Europe: Swiss Epidemic of 1628–1630

Abstract: The course of plague is markedly influenced by seasonal factors. A quantitative estimate of its seasonal distribution was made from parish death books of 38 communities in a small, diversified area of Switzerland for the epidemic period of 1628--1630. The temporal distribution of outbreaks was bimodal with maximal mortalities in the autumn-early winter seasons of two successive years. Of 43 peaks of mortality, 39 occurred between September and January; November was the month of highest frequency. Colder weather exerted a gradual limiting influence, but late-blooming community outbreaks continued at a high or maximal level as late as January. Evidence is presented that the temporal distribution of outbreaks affected the persistence of plague in the region. The seasonality of plague in Switzerland contrasts with the pattern in Great Britain, where midsummer epidemics prevailed.

Production of diapause eggs by the australian plague locust after migration

Abstract: Plague locusts, Chortoicetes terminifera (Walker), that emigrated from Longreach to Cunnamulla, Queensland, produced non-diapause eggs. Those that emigrated further to Tottenham, N.S.W. produced diapause eggs within 7 days indicating that diapause induction is rapid and can occur in fully grown adults.

Contemporary Plagues and Social Progress

Abstract: For this address at the opening session of the First Mexican National Congress of Infectious Diseases in Children (ler, Congreso National de Infectologia Pediatrica), I have chosen as my title "Contemporary Plagues and Social Progress." While in medicine the term plague usually refers to diseases caused by Pasteurella pestis, the word has broader meanings and usages. It describes that which smites or troubles, can refer to an afflictive evil or anything troublesome or vexatious, or can be applied to any malignant disease, especially those that are contagious. It can be used as an expression of annoyance, as a mild oath, or with the implication of harassment. Thus, today we are concerned with the plague of plagues, the afflictive evils of the cumulative insults of infectious disease. Additionally, we might be tempted to cast a plague on the system of medical education and on the political process that neither conveys the continuing importance of infectious diseases nor funds the mechanisms for their containment. Or, should the shoe be on the other foot? Should not society cast a plague on us? As experts in the field of infectious disease, have we not failed to publicize that, on a global basis, the combination of diarrheal disease and malnutrition is the leading cause of death in infants and children? Has not our successful use of antibiotics induced unjustified public complacency regarding the problems of infectious disease? Why have our low-keyed reports of resistant typhoid bacilli, or pneumococci or of gonococci failed to dispel the prevalent mystique that science has controlled infectious agents, leaving cancer and heart disease in the public eye as the major unconquered problems in the health field?

The 1888 pneumonia in Middlesbrough.

Abstract: Middlesbrough in 1888 was 58 years old the fastest-growing town in Victorian England. The area was accustomed to winter attacks of pneumonia, so for the Medical Officer of Health, Dr John A Malcolmson, to be concerned 'about a serious and very fatal epidemic of pneumonia in the town' suggests an epidemic of grave proportions. In June 1888, Dr Edward Ballard, an experienced Inspector for the Local Government Board, and Dr Edward Emanuel Klein, the foremost bacteriologist of that time, were asked to investigate the outbreak. The facts quoted in this paper are from the Report of the Medical Officer to the Local Government Board for 1888 (Ballard & Klein 1888). Table 1 gives the total number of pneumonia deaths in Middlesbrough for the years 1880 up to 1887, and during 1888; the epidemic ran from February until the end of July 1888.