China reports suspected bubonic plague case in Inner Mongolia
Local health authorities in China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region have reported a suspected bubonic plague case.
Officials in the Bayannur district raised the plague warning on Sunday - ordering residents to send for treatment anyone with fever or showing other possible signs of infection.
Plague can be fatal in up to 90% of people infected if not treated, primarily with several types of antibiotics.
The threat of the new infection comes as China appears to have its coronavirus outbreak under control with few new cases reported each day.
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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 the plague, but occasional cases are still reported, especially among hunters coming into contact with fleas carrying the bacterium.
Officials in the Bayannur district have told people to stop hunting wild animals since the suspected case arose.
The last major known outbreak was in 2009, when several people died in the town of Ziketan in Qinghai province on the Tibetan Plateau.
Along with the coronavirus - detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year - the country has dealt with African swine fever, which has devastated pig herds.
China has gone weeks without reporting a new death from the coronavirus - on Monday authorities reported just one new case of local infection in the capital, Beijing.