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The first pandemic occurred during the sixth century a.d., during the reign of the Emperor Justinian. The second pandemic occurred during the Middle Ages--it is the one we call the Black Death. The third pandemic lasted until 1959. Many of you who are reading this article don't realize it, but you are a survivor of the third great bubonic plague pandemic, which killed far more people--over thirteen million!--than the other two pandemics combined.
In 1894 a few cases of plague were documented in Canton, and from there it spread to Hong Kong. Although the initial outbreak was relatively small, the disease was quickly carried to many parts of the world by ocean-going vessels. In its westward course, the plague reached India, and then Africa and Europe (especially Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Great Britain). It also spread eastward to the Philippines, Australia, Japan, Hawaii, and the Pacific coasts of North and South America.
PLAGUE IN THE UNITED STATES
Human plague was diagnosed for the first time in the United States in 1900, at San Francisco, and shown to be present among rats in that city in 1902. At first business interests, in collusion with conservative politicians in both the city and the state, resisted official acknowledgment of plague as well as all official efforts to control its spread. This refusal to address the problem for fear of hurting business led to a far worse outbreak than would otherwise have occurred. Eventually, other states quarantined California, and forced them to deal with the plague after all.
Many of the deaths during the third pandemic were concentrated in the less developed parts of the world, especially in India between 1898 and 1928. There were several hundred plague deaths in the United States during the last century, including several in the 1990s.
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