The World Health Organization (WHO) said Wednesday that an outbreak of plague in Madagascar has slowed but 71 people among the 263 known to have caught the disease since last September have died. The latest outbreak peaked in November and December but the plague season continues until April. The WHO said that the spread of the disease could have been quickened by heavy rains and flooding in January. The bacterial disease is mainly spread by flea-carrying rats. Humans bitten by an infected flea usually develop a bubonic form of plague, which swells the lymph node and can be treated with antibiotics, according to the WHO. "However, control of plague outbreaks in Madagascar has been complicated by development of resistance to deltamethrin – the first-line insecticide – in the fleas that transmit the disease from rats to humans," the WHO said in a statement.
