Reddit reviews The Barbary Plague: The Black Death in Victorian San Francisco

> spread the plague

For those wondering, yes, the plague. They are one of the few natural reservoirs for it in North America.
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Incidentally, you do NOT want fleas from a prairie dog to bite you. They will start to "abandon ship" as soon as the body starts cooling, so do not stick around. You also don't want your cat to ever interact with prairie dogs, because once the cat gets the plague, it can be transmitted by respiratory droplets (cat sneezes, yes, really!).

This reminds me of a true story from Marilyn Chase's non-fiction The Barbary Plague, which takes place in early 1900s San Fransisco. During a outbreak surveying expedition, the team of epidemiologists came across as dead squirrel in the park which was thought to have died of plague. It had been dead for a while, so the fleas should have been gone, but all of a sudden they noticed their arms and legs covered with fleas! They scrambled to knock the fleas off or kill them, but to no avail, there were too many and too small, they already gotten under their clothes, already bitten them dozens of times... The assumed they'd all die in a matter of days (no antibiotics of course), as they confirmed that the squirrel did die of plague. Days later though, the realized they had been incredibly lucky. They had been attacked by nymph fleas which had just been born from eggs laid on the squirrel (only reason they were still hanging around) and those nymphs had never fed on the squirrel which was already cold by the time they were born. Can you imagine going through that!?!

You should do a monthly PH book club too. There are lots of public health related books that are also very interesting and entertaining. I would recommend starting with The Barbary Plague by Marilyn Chase. The plot revolves around the epidemiologists trying to deal with the Plague outbreak of turn of the century San Fransisco. Remember that for these folks, the field of epidemiology was very new. They still admired Kochs lab since there was no direct equivalent anywhere in the USA. A large portion of the book is about Joseph Kinyoun, the physician and epidemiologist who went on to found the United States' Hygienic Laboratory. Ever heard of it? Today is called the National Institutes of Health.

There was a fantastically terrifying bit where they were looking for evidence of plague among animals in the park and ended up stumbling upon a squirrel that had obviously died of plague. After a few seconds of examination, they realized they were absolutely covered in fleas... too many to possibly shake off, moments later, little specks of blood started to appear...

[spoilers] By amazing luck, the fleas were all very young instars that had hatched after the squirrel had died. Since the squirrel was cold when they were born, they never tried to feed on it. The fleas were waiting on the squirrel for another host to come by, but they had never been infected themselves. There is evidence of vertical transmission of other pathogens in such fleas, but thankfully not plague.

If you're interested, there's a great book about how the Chinese people in San Francisco during the Bubonic Plague. It was eye opening and beautifully written.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Barbary-Plague-Victorian-Francisco/dp/0375757082