now. 

The pneumonic plague is caused by the same bacteria as the bubonic plague and can spread from person to person through airborne respiratory droplets, typically from sneezing or coughing. Medical experts say cases require rapid treatment with powerful antibiotics to prevent fatalities.

But  it's actually very hard  for pneumonic plague to spread from person to person, Jha said.

 We may see a few more people get infected, but the chances that this becomes a larger outbreak, let alone a global pandemic, is exceedingly low,  he said.

From 2019 to 2025, 10 countries reported more than 3,800 suspected human plague cases to the WHO, the agency said last week. Six of the countries ended up having confirmed cases, most of them in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar, with 423 deaths.

Carolin Sri-Narayana and Michael Holleran contributed.