1994: The Plague Epidemic

The pneumonic plague broke out in Surat, Gujarat. It was caused due to heavy rains in Surat,
which resulted in clogged sewers. This resulted in dead animals which were left out in open.
Also, the refuse got mixed up with slush and mud. It was left on the bank of the river. That
created favourable conditions for the spread of plague. 1 Tourism also got affected at the place, as
people cancelled their trips after the outbreak of the epidemic. It has also been alleged that this
plague in Surat got spread due to the earthquake which happened in Maharashtra in 1993. Many
dead bodies were not recovered. Rats fed on these bodies and as a result there was an increase in
their population.2
Plague a deadly disease which is spread vast fear into the minds of the people. The famous swipe
out of a part of the population of Europe during the dark-age was due to plague. Plague is a kind
of bacterial infection, which is caused by a bacteria called as Yersinia pestis.3 Symptoms of this
deadly disease are: fever, chills, aching muscles, prostration, and abdominal discomfort.
This disease gets spread from the rats. Certain breeds of rats at times becomes infected, due to
which they die. The remaining ones of that breed pounce onto other animals for their source of
blood. People who come into the contact of such animals becomes infected by the bites of these
fleas, which subsequently causes plague, and it spreads quickly as it is very contagious.
Pneumonic plague infects the respiratory system of the person. It killed 52 people and lasted for
two weeks.4
In Surat plague, another variable permitting of bacillus plague was that wide range anti-infection
agents, required to control the illness, had been depleted because of frenzy purchasing of the
over-the-counter anti-toxins in light of media proposals. Doctors and drug specialists getting
away from the city brought a lot of treatment medications away with them for their families and
1 "Surat: A Victim of Its Open Sewers". New York Times. September 25, 1994. Retrieved 2008-04-26.
2 Plague in India--l994 Conditions, Containment, Goals, Judith B. Tysmans, University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill, School of Public Health, Health Policy and Administration.
3 "The Surat Plague and its Aftermath". Godshen Robert Pallipparambil. Retrieved 2008-04-26.
4 Dutt, Ashok (July 2006). "Surat Plague of 1994 Re-Examined" (PDF). Review 37 (4): 755760.
Retrieved 31 October 2015.

companions. Preventive dosing with the crucial anti-toxin made finding pharmaceutical for
treatment of suspected cases very hard. Authorities struck drug stores where anti-infection agents
were being accumulated at underground market costs because of lack, and turned the antimicrobials over to wellbeing authorities. Lacking supply persevered in light of the fact that those
with sufficient assets to purchase bought and accumulated pharmaceutical, intensifying the odds
of the poor to have drug accessible in the event that they turned out to be sick.5
The main period of the disease happened in Surat and then spread by tainted patients still in the
hatching stage to Delhi via prepare, and afterward to Mumbai. It then spread to Calcutta
(Kolkata). Amid the following stage, patients conveyed the malady to Nasik in Maharashtra
which lies in the middle of Surat and Bombay. Amid the principal period of the spread of
disease, at the point when the sickness was limited to Surat and its neighboring zones, the
ailment diffused in a quite non-uniform manner. This "procedure takes after the standards of
separation rot at each step. Short-remove contacts are more probable than long-remove contacts,
yet after some time the infection may have spread a long way from the first site. Amid this stage
the disease stayed kept to a span of 40 km around the city of Surat. This procedure is called
extension dissemination, in which the illness frequently heightens in the starting district" while
"new zones are being included.6
There are some lessons which should be learned from Surat epidemic. These are as follows:
(i)
(ii)
(iii)
(iv)

There should be transparency and willingness to accept foreign help.

There should a national database which will be used to track isolated cases.
Surveillance of all rodents should be done on time for the prevention of the disease.
The spread of epidemics should be hidden from the press.7

Better surveillance system established since 1994 has identified several other plague outbreaks in
the country.8 A quarter century it was the twofold hit of epidemic in Surat in 1994 and the
5 Plague in India--l994 Conditions, Containment, Goals, Judith B. Tysmans, University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill, School of Public Health, Health Policy and Administration.
6 SURAT PLAGUE OF 1994 RE-EXAMINED, Ashok K Dutt, Rais Akhtar and Melinda McVeigh.
7 Plague in Surat: 20 Years Later, Contagions, December 18, 2014.
8 Ibid.

disclosure of anti-infection safe plague in Madagascar in 1995 that raised worry about re-rising
contamination ailments.