Plague deaths continue in Congo

INTERNATIONAL health officials warned over the weekend that 61 miners in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo have died and hundreds have become ill from what seems to be the largest outbreak in decades of a highly virulent, airborne version of plague.

Health officials said thousands more workers have fled the open-pit diamond mine that is the epicentre of the outbreak, possibly spreading the disease deep into a rural province with few health facilities.

Pneumonic plague is rarer and more frequently fatal than bubonic plague, which is spread by the bites of rat-borne fleas.