The Black Death - the real culprit?

[chaznich]

Hi there,

I work for a TV company and I've been doing a lot of research into the Black Death and whether it was, in fact, caused by Yersinia pestis or was actually a new emergent haemorrhagic fever like Ebola. I've found Susan Scott's and Christopher Duncan's - of Liverpool University - work particularly fascinating However, as yet I note that no Black Death corpse has been found presevered enough for some of the soft tissues to be intact and therefore the DNA of the disease-causing organism has not been extractable (I spoke with a scientist formerly of Oxford Uni whose research indicates that Yersinia Pestis DNA cannot be extracted from the teeth of Black Death victims, as previously thought).We're keen to do a programme examining once-and-for-all what the actual cause was, so I wondered if there is any move afoot by anyone in the world to try and find a well-preserved Black death corpse - probably preserved in perma-frost and perhaps from Scandinavia or Iceland - to analyse? Or indeed if there's any new research underway at the moment to try and definitively determine out the cause? I'd be extremely grateful if anyone has any information. Many thanks, Charlie

[jtendres]

Hi, the Black Death is considered as an epidemic of Bubonic Plague and there is high evidence that it is caused by Yersinia pestis because there are still people that get infected by it.
My medical microbiology professor will be going into more detail later in the course, but he has mentioned that Lake Tahoe might be facing a problem with this bacteria.
One Lake Tahoe website mentions: Avoid setting up camp near rodent burrows. Fleas from rodents, if they bite you, can transmit the bubonic plague."