Plague update: Crook County teen out of ICU

A Crook County teen is out of the intensive care unit at St. Charles Bend and in fair condition as she recovers from a rare case of bubonic plague contracted during a hunting trip; her family expressed gratitude Monday for the community’s support.

The girl caught the disease from a flea bite on her abdomen while her family was hunting near Heppner in northeast Oregon’s Morrow County earlier this month.

Just days later, she started to feel sick.

The teen was moved out of the St. Charles ICU on Friday, said Karen Yeargain, Crook County Public Health communicable disease coordinator.

“She is fair condition and continues to improve,” Yeargain said after a conservation with the teen’s mother.

“The girl’s mother also relayed the family’s gratitude to the whole community for the support they have received during this difficult time,” she added.

On Friday, state Public Health Veterinarian Dr. Emilio DeBess said. “Obviously, you know, it’s going to take her a couple of weeks for her to be completely well.”

Yeargain said the move out of ICU was planned, as once the teen had been on specific antibiotics that treat plague for 72 hours she is “considered totally non-infectious (and) not considered contagious any more.”

Still, health officials say the teen could be hospitalized for more than three weeks until she fully recovers.

The state Public Health Division is working with several counties, including Crook and Morrow, to investigate the illness.

“We also look at who has been in close contact with that person, since they’ve became sick and has that contact been in a way that could transmit disease,” Yeargain said.

The others on the camping trip showed no signs of contracting the plague, according to public health officials.

According to state health officials, there have been a total of eight human cases of the plague in Oregon over the past decade, none of them fatal. Fifteen people have been infected with bubonic plague so far this year in the nation, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.