Thousands of people in northwest China have been diagnosed with a highly-infectious bacterial disease after an outburst caused by a leak at a pharmaceutical company.
The Health Commission of Lanzhou, the capital city of Gansu province, ratified that 3,245 people had contracted the disease brucellosis, which is often caused by contact with livestock carrying the bacteria Brucella.
Another 1,401 people have tested as preliminarily positive, though there have been no fatalities reported, the city’s Health Commission said. In total, authorities have tested 21,847 people out of the city’s 2.9 million population.
The disease is also known as Malta or Mediterranean fever. However, human-to-human transmission of the virus is very rare, according to the United States’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most people are infected by eating polluted food or breath in the bacteria.
Few symptoms can become chronic or never go away, like arthritis or swelling in certain organs, according to the United States’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Brucellosis had been much more general in China in the 1980s, though it has since declined.
In the months after the outbreak, regional and municipal officials launched an investigation into the leak at the factory, according to the Lanzhou Health Commission.
By January, authorities had revoked vaccine production licenses for the plant and withdrew product approval numbers for its two Brucellosis vaccines.
A total of seven veterinary drug product approval numbers were also cancelled in the factory.
In February, the factory issued a public apology and said it had “severely punished” eight people who were determined as responsible for the incident. It added. (ANI)