Single strain of plague bacteria sparked multiple historical and modern pandemics

Posted by on June 8, 2016 6:25 pm
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Categories: health

A single entry of the plague bacterium into Europe was responsible for the Black Plague of the mid-14th century. This same strain sparked recurrent outbreaks on the continent over the following four centuries before spreading to China, where it triggered the third plague pandemic in the late 19th century. The wave of plague that traveled to Asia later became the source population for modern-day epidemics around the globe, reveals genome analyses of the bacterium.

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