In the Middle Ages, plague was known as the "Black Death." Both measles and explosive streptococcal disease appear to be much less likely candidates.In 2001, a mass grave was discovered that belonged to the plague years. In the bubonic form there is also swelling of lymph nodes, while in the septicemic form tissues may turn black and die, and in the pneumonic form shortness of breath, cough and chest pain may occur. The peculiar seasonal pattern of plague has been observed everywhere and is a systematic feature also of the spread of the Black Death. In “The Plague at Athens: A New Oar in Muddied Waters,” Clifford H. Eby and Harold D. Evjen conceded that Thucydides' description of the outbreak's symptoms, resembling a number of known infectious diseases, would allow the reader to draw their own conclusion as to the precise disease affecting Athens in 430 BCE. It is caused by the bacterium, Yersinia pestis.Humans usually get plague after being bitten by a rodent flea that is carrying the plague bacterium or by handling an animal infected with plague. Plague is primarily a disease of rodents, transmitted from animal to animal by fleas. Usually this begins one to seven days after exposure. As nouns the difference between disease and plague is that disease is (pathology) an abnormal condition of the body or mind that causes discomfort or dysfunction; distinct from injury insofar as the latter is usually instantaneously acquired while plague is the bubonic plague, the pestilent disease caused by the virulent bacterium ''yersinia pestis . Plague is a vector-borne infectious disease caused by the bacteria known as Yersinia pestis. Plague is an infectious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Claim: A meme documents that plagues occur every 100 years. A bacterial infection found mainly in rodents and associated fleas, plague readily leaps … Plague is one of the deadliest diseases in human history, second only to smallpox. When a rodent dies of plague, its associated fleas look for another rodent host. Symptoms include fever, weakness and headache. After the plague diagnosis in China, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention said there was an extremely low risk of it spreading, state media China Daily reported. Plague has a high fatality rate, and people have described outbreaks of the bacterial infection for centuries. The fact that plague is transmitted by rat fleas means plague is a disease of the warmer seasons, disappearing during the winter, or at least lose most of their powers of spread. The first category includes typhus, arboviral diseases, and plague, and the second category includes smallpox. The plague decimated Constantinople and spread like wildfire across Europe, Asia, North Africa and Arabia killing an estimated 30 to 50 million people, perhaps half of the world’s population. Plague is a disease that affects humans and other mammals. If the fleas cannot readily find another rodent to act as a host, then the fleas may jump onto whatever mammal is nearby. The Black Death, also known as The Plague, was a pandemic affecting most of Europe and large swaths of Asia from 1346 through 1353 that wiped out between 100 and 200 million people in just a few short years.