A 16-year-old girl from Crook County, Ore. contracted bubonic plague while out on a hunting trip, health officials have confirmed.
Officials from the Oregon Health Authority believe that the girl came into contact with the disease from a flea bite during a hunting trip near Heppner on Oct. 16.
The girl fell ill five days later and was admitted to an intensive care unit at a Bend hospital, according to USA Today.
Local health officials are working with state officials and federal epidemiologists to examine the illness. No other people are believed to have been affected by the disease.
A rarity in today's times, the bubonic plague was widespread during the medieval period. For the past two decades, there have been eight cases of bubonic plague in Oregon alone, however, none of those cases led to deaths, Fox News reported.
An Oregon man lost his fingers and toes because of the plague, which he contracted from his cat as he was trying to retrieve a mouse from his cat's throat back in 2012.
There have been 16 cases of bubonic plague reported in the U.S. this year, including this one, with four of them leading to deaths, the Daily Mail U.K. reported.
