The mouse is mightier than Debra Welsh suspected. Welsh, who lives northwest of Albuquerque, is recovering from a bout with bubonic plague, and she thinks she knows how she got it. And they would die real fast. Killed Millions in 1300s Bubonic plague, also known as the Black Death, killed an estimated 25 million people in Europe between 1346 and 1351, wiping out nearly one-third of the population. It is a bacterial disease, generally transmitted to humans from the bites of fleas infected by dead or dying rodents.
Most people lapse into illness within seven days after exposure.
Plague is typically thought to be a summertime disease but can strike year-round. She said she hoped to return home today from the hospital, where she has been kept on antibiotics. Around Mice Keller said his department is trying to determine how she got the plague. Welsh thinks it was from those funny mice that entered her home, the last of which she found around Christmas. I actually saw it and it ran behind a cabinet.