![]() The capital of the empire, Constantinople, was the hardest hit city during the epidemic and reported up to 300,000 deaths in the first year alone (up to 10,000 per day). The plague takes its name from Justinian I, who was the Emperor of the Byzantines during the outbreak, and who contracted the virus himself (but survived). The first major plague pandemic, accepted as the first epidemic ever recorded with reliability, was the Plague of Justinian in 541. The three major plague pandemics have been traced back to Central Asia, where colonies of rodents act as natural reservoirs in which the disease has survived for millennia. However, the plague can also become pneumonic if the infection enters the lungs, or septicemic if it enters the blood stream both of which are rarer, but more fatal than the bubonic plague. The bubonic plague is the most common form of the disease. ![]() ![]() Yersinia pestis simultaneously kills infected cells while preventing their communication with the body’s immune system, which means that the disease is almost always fatal if left untreated. When infected rat fleas bite humans, they infect them with bubonic plague, which causes swelling in the lymph nodes around the bite. When a flea is infected with the plague, the bacteria blocks its stomach and makes feeding difficult the flea then becomes more aggressive as it feeds, regurgitating the bacteria into the bite wounds, and transmitting the infection to the host. It is caused by the bacteria Yersinia pestis, which is spread primarily by rats and their fleas. The plague is arguably the most infamous and feared disease in human history. ![]()
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