Chinese Town Sealed Off After Plague Outbreak

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http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20090803/twl-chinese-town-sealed-off-after-plague-3fd0ae9.html

Chinese Town Sealed Off After Plague Outbreak

7 hours 37 mins ago
SkyNews © Sky News 2009

A town of 10,000 people in north west China has been sealed off from the outside world after an outbreak of deadly pneumonic plague.

Chinese Town Sealed Off After Plague Outbreak Enlarge photo

The town of Ziketan in Qinghai Province has been quarantined after a dozen people were infected with the highly contagious lung disease.

The outbreak has already claimed two lives. A herdsman died from the disease on Friday and his neighbour died on Sunday.

Another 10 people, mostly relatives of the dead men, were undergoing treatment in an isolation hospital. A team of medical experts are being flown into the remote town.

Health authorities are warning that anyone suffering from a cough or fever who has visited the town since the middle of last month should seek urgent medical attention.

There are fears the disease may have spread before the town was sealed off.

Pneumonic plague is easily transmitted through the air and can be passed from person to person by coughing. It is the same bacteria that occurs in bubonic plague.

The Black Death killed more than 25 million people throughout western europe in the Middle Ages.

According to the World Health Organisation, pneumonic plague is one of the deadliest infectious diseases and can kill within 24 hours of infection.