Editing Third plague pandemic (section)

==Origins==
The bubonic plague was endemic in populations of infected ground [[rodents]] in [[Central Asia]] and was a known cause of death among the migrant and established human populations in that region for centuries. An influx of new people because of political conflicts and global trade led to the spread of the disease throughout the world from Asia to the rest of Europe, to reach [[Africa]] and the [[Americas]].{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}

A [[natural reservoir]] or nidus for plague is in western [[Yunnan]]: it is still a health risk. The third pandemic of plague originated in the area after a rapid influx of [[Han Chinese]] to exploit the demand for minerals, primarily [[copper]], in the second half of the 19th century.<ref name = "benedict96">{{cite book|last1=Benedict|first1=Carol|title=Bubonic plague in eighteenth-century China|date=1996|publisher=Stanford Univ. Press|location=Stanford, CA|isbn=978-0804726610|pages=[https://archive.org/details/bubonicplagueinn00bene/page/47 47, 70]|url=https://archive.org/details/bubonicplagueinn00bene/page/47}}</ref> By 1850, the population had exploded to over 7 million people. Increasing transportation throughout the region brought people in contact with [[Xenopsylla cheopis|plague-infected fleas]], the primary vector between the yellow-breasted or buff-breasted rat (''Rattus flavipectus'')<ref>{{cite journal | last=Mei-Wen | first=ZHANG | last2=Cong | first2=GUO | last3=Yong | first3=WANG | last4=Zhong-Jun | first4=HU | last5=An-Guo | first5=CHEN | title=The Buff-Breasted Rats (Rattus flavipectus) in China | journal=Zoological Research | volume=21 | issue=6 | date=2000-12-22 | issn=2095-8137 | pages=487–497 | url=https://www.zoores.ac.cn/en/article/id/697 }}</ref> aka [[Rattus tanezumi|''Rattus'' ''tanezumi'']] and humans. People brought the fleas and rats back into growing urban areas, where small outbreaks sometimes reached epidemic proportions. The plague spread further and began to appear in the [[Pearl River (China)|Pearl River]] delta, including [[Guangzhou|Canton]] and [[Hong Kong]]. Although [[William H. McNeill (historian)|William McNeil]] and others believe the plague to have been brought from the interior to the coastal regions by troops returning from battles against the Muslim rebels, Benedict suggested evidence to favor the growing and lucrative [[opium]] trade, which began after about 1840.<ref name = benedict96/>

In the city of [[Guangzhou|Canton]], beginning in March 1894, the disease killed 80,000 people in a few weeks. Daily water-traffic with the nearby city of Hong Kong rapidly spread the plague. Within two months, after 100,000 deaths, the death rates dropped below epidemic rates, but the disease continued to be endemic in Hong Kong until 1929.<ref name=pryor>{{cite journal|last1=Pryor|first1=E.G.|title=The Great Plague of Hong Kong|journal=Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society|date=1975|volume=15|pages=61–70 |pmid=11614750|url=http://cultus.hk/middle_ages/plagueHK.pdf}}</ref>