Overview

• The fatality in Coconino County, confirmed July 11, is the first U.S. bubonic plague death of the year and Arizona’s first since 2007.
• Health authorities are conducting an exposure investigation and expanding wildlife surveillance after a spike in prairie dog die-offs earlier this month.
• Teams have intensified rodent control and sanitation efforts in northern Arizona to break the plague cycle in local rodent reservoirs.
• Bubonic plague, caused by Yersinia pestis, spreads primarily through bites of infected fleas and rarely transmits between humans.
• Early antibiotic treatment remains highly effective, and the CDC records an average of seven plague cases annually in southwestern states.