While China appears to have reduced coronavirus cases to near zero, other infectious threats remain, with local health authorities announcing a suspected bubonic plague case in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
Plague can be fatal in up to 90% of people infected if not treated, primarily with several types of antibiotics.
Pneumonic plague can develop from bubonic plague and results in a severe lung infection causing shortness of breath, headache and coughing.
China has largely eradicated plague, but occasional cases are still reported, especially among hunters coming into contact with fleas carrying the bacterium. The last major known outbreak was in 2009, when several people died in the town of Ziketan in Qinghai province on the Tibetan Plateau.
