Let's Talk About Rabies

Rabies and Why It Worries Me


I was in a conversation today, which shall remain unlinked, that involved someone laughing at my fear of being attacked by a rabid animal and preference for being armed just in case. Barring all the cultural training that I received as a child - Cujo being just the top of that large heap of articles, books, and movies - let's look at the facts that surround rabies right now in 2017.


How Rabies Works
  • Rabies mainly concentrates in the cranium, the spine, and the saliva.
  • Exposure involves getting saliva in a wound or on the mucous membranes - eyes, mouth, etc.
  • You may not exhibit symptoms for 9 days to several years after exposure.
  • If you do exhibit symptoms, there is an over 99% chance you will die.
  • Final diagnosis is post-mortem - AFTER you die - as the best test involves removing the brain.


Didn't need that anyway.

How Post Exposure Treatment Works
  • You get bitten by an animal.
  • IF you are lucky, you can bring that animal to be killed, tested for rabies, and cleared.
  • IF you are NOT lucky, you receive the rabies post-exposure prophylaxis (RPEP) treatments.
  • This is a series of injections over multiple visits.
  • It is extremely painful.
  • It is expensive. (Average of $3000 before insurance, can be as much as $17,000.)
  • If you are like 99% of those that receive treatment, you will be fine.
  • If not, you will manifest symptoms and you will probably die.


Doesn't approach the truth, much less handle it.

So, to reiterate, looking at the front page of Google: The person listed as the single incident in this screen shot is dead. Oh, and - according to the CDC - there were TWO cases in 2015. Not one. Both patients are dead and they died of rabies.


Meanwhile, if the GOP has their say... 
  • Healthcare? Being cut - with nothing being enforced as a requirement for minimum coverage nor a ruling on maximum cost out of pocket. 
  • Government support for programs that assist the poor? Being cut, they don't need food, shelter, and medical care, anyway. 
  • Education? No one but the elite really needs that.


In 2014, the last numbers available at the CDC, rabies was on the rise in 2014 and we had 6,033 cases of rabid animals in the USA. This includes the 5,588 wild and 455 domesticated animals. This includes a few cows and some sheep, in addition to the standard list of dogs, cats, etc. (The next year, 2015, shows a few Alpaca in the report from the Virginia Department of Health. Who knew Virginia had Alpaca?)

So, with those numbers, do we want to lay odds on just how quickly the number of infected people rises? Just how high the death toll will be? The ER is only legally required to stabilize you, not cure you, if you can't afford their prices. And, almost all RPEP happens in the ER or in a few state funded clinics.... Which, remember, are having their funding cut, too.

How will our fate compare to the rest of the world?


What the REST of the World Experiences
  • Rabies treatment can cost over a month of salary for a single person, in spite of the subsidies and donations provided by more prosperous countries.
  • 40% of those bitten are under the age of 15.
  • The world wide death toll is 35,000-60,000 people, mostly in Asia and Africa.
  • The primary source of infection for a human is a family pet - dog, cat, and monkey being most common.
  • Other sources of rabies are racoons, bats, skunks, foxes, rodents, coyotes, etc.

So, yes. I'd rather be armed than bitten. I'd really rather that we have universal healthcare, so that all of this is covered for everyone. As it is seeming less and less likely? Killing an aggressive animal costs less than a dollar, doesn't require that I get shots, and doesn't risk my life. 



Sources and Further Reading
(In no particular order)
  • https://www.cdc.gov/rabies/diagnosis/animals-humans.html
  • https://www.cdc.gov/rabies/location/usa/cost.html
  • https://thebillfold.com/the-costs-of-not-dying-from-rabies-1ba5246685c7
  • http://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/pdfplus/10.2460/javma.248.7.777
  • http://www.who.int/rabies/resources/who_wer9207/en/
  • http://www.paho.org/hq/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7248%3A2012-rabies-cases-have-declined-95-percent-americas-since-1980&Itemid=1926&lang=en
  • http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs099/en/
  • http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/rabies-is-killing-more-than-55000-a-year-2360517.html
  • http://southernnevadahealthdistrict.org/health-care-providers/rabies-protocol.php


Comments

Post a Comment