A patient in Colorado tested positive for plague last week, and officials have been unable to track the source of the infection, according to CNN. Humans get plague through bites from fleas infected with the bacterium Yersinia pestis.
Shockingly, the United States reports an average of seven cases of plague each year–sometimes as high as 17–with Colorado one of the hot spots, having 67 reported cases since 1970. If you don’t want to get plague, don’t hang out around the rodents the infected fleas live on.
While historically plague is real killer–you don’t get the name The Black Death for nothing–modern antibiotics can defeat the infection if treated promptly. Currently, the United States has no vaccine against plague, although the Biden Administration awarded a $22 million research contract to develop one to protect the military who are deployed in areas where an outbreak may occur.