Manchurian plague
pneumonic plague outbreak in 1910–1911
The Manchurian plague was an outbreak of pneumonic plague that occurred mainly in Manchuria in 1910–1911. It killed 60,000 people, stimulating a multinational medical response and the wearing of the first personal protective equipment (PPE).
The outbreak is thought to have originated from a tarbagan marmot which was carrying Yersinia pestis. The disease was spread when marmot fur hunters gathered together during the winter months, and then infected migrant workers during the Chinese New Year. The Cambridge-trained doctor Wu Lien-teh led Chinese efforts to end the plague, and promoted quarantine and the wearing of cloth face masks as safety measures. The hardest hit cities included Changchun, Harbin, and Mukden (now Shenyang). Although the disease was largely confined to Manchuria, a number of plague cases were reported in cities such as Beijing and Tianjin.
The Manchurian plague highlighted the importance of a multinational medical response, setting precedents for organizations such as the World Health Organization. Wu Lien-teh's widespread promotion of cloth face mask-wearing by doctors, nurses, patients, contacts, and (to the degree that it was possible) the population at large was the first time such an epidemic containment measure had been attempted. The event was also influential in establishing the use of personal protective equipment to stop the spread of disease, and is credited for the origins of the modern hazmat suit.
“Manchurian plague” enters the record as pneumonic plague outbreak in 1910–1911. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Manchurian, plague and pneumonic can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “Manchurian plague” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.