A 15-year-old boy died in Kyrgyzstan of the plague. The boy seems to have been bitten by a flea, the Kyrgyz Ministry of Health reported. 160 people were quarantined.
In Kyrgyzstan, 160 people who came into contact with a boy who died of the plague last week, reported the Kyrgyz health ministry on Wednesday. Four people were also admitted to the hospital with symptoms of this dangerous infectious disease.
According to the Ministry of Health, a total of 160 people had contact with the 15-year-old Timerbek Isakunov, who suffered from the plague. He died on August 22 in the Aksuu region in the northeast of Kyrgyzstan, near the famous Issyk-Kul Lake, the second largest mountain lake in the world, eagerly visited by tourists.
All these people are under medical care and take antibiotics – the message reads, adding that the condition of all patients is satisfactory.
In addition to them, four more people were hospitalized with high fever, one of the symptoms of the plague. These people had no contact with Isakunov. According to a government source, a woman and two children developed swollen lymph nodes in the neck and armpits together with a fever on Tuesday – a hallmark symptom of the plague. However, the health ministry assured on Wednesday that the results of preliminary studies of the three patients were negative. There is no further information about the condition of the fourth person.
15-year-old Isakunov worked as an itinerant shepherd in a mountain village in Aksuu, near the border with Kazakhstan and China. According to the Ministry of Health, he died of the plague, and the infection was most likely caused by a bite by fleas. The plague is often spread through fleas that have previously been bitten by infected rats or other rodents.
The previous case of the plague in Kyrgyzstan was recorded 30 years ago. (PAP)
klm/ ap/