The World Health Organization (WHO) map, updated on September 29, outlines the geographic distribution of plague over the past seven years.
According to the data, nearly 4,000 suspected or confirmed cases of plague were recorded globally between 2019 and 2025. Outbreaks are predominantly reported across three continents: Africa, Asia, and South America.
The African continent is particularly prominent on the WHO map. The document notes that since the 1990s, the highest number of human cases has occurred here, with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar marked as the primary hotspots.
The organization emphasizes that plague is a zoonotic disease present on all continents except Oceania. Consequently, the risk of infection persists wherever the causative bacterium (Yersinia pestis) and human populations coexist.
