Nature & Environment
Bats Spread Rabies In Human Without Obvious Bite, One Rabid Bat Found In Arlington Heights
Saranya Palanisamy
First Posted: Jun 04, 2016 08:01 AM EDT
Now bats are the new threat for people in the US as they were found to spread rabies in human without an obvious bite. An elderly woman was reported to have died of rabies after her encounter with a rabid bat at her Wyoming home last August.
The elderly woman reportedly woke up in the middle of the night disturbed by a bat on her neck. She swatted it away and washed her hand before going to bed. Her husband caught the bat with gloves on his hands and said to have left it outside the house, according to NPR.
The couple didn't mind to call a doctor since she suffered no obvious bite wounds, reported Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) on Thursday. After a month the woman was allegedly hospitalized for eight days of mystery illness. That is when the woman's family is said to have remembered the bat incident happened a month ago.
Lab tests were carried out immediately to detect rabies infection, which turned out to be positive. Earlier the doctors were said to have mistaken the respiratory failure, weakness and slurred speech experienced by the woman for Guillain-Barre syndrome.
The woman's family members and 22 health care workers were then given post exposure treatment for rabies. Had the woman visited the doctor earlier, she could have been saved and the exposure to other people could have been contained. Lack of awareness on potential risk of rabies by bats caused the family to lose a life.
"Lack of referral to guidance concerning health risks associated with bats living in the home was possibly a missed opportunity to prevent rabies infection," public health officials noted.
Meanwhile, a bat caught in Arlington Heights tested positive for rabies. It was then transferred to Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) after the results were out on Wednesday. IDPH noted that the bats are active during warm weather and around 97 bats tested positive for rabies in 2015, noted ABC.
"A live bat trapped in a northwest suburban Arlington Heights home last week has tested positive for rabies. Animal control officers were called to the house in the 400 block of North Haddow Avenue on May 27 after a bat was captured inside, according to a statement from Arlington Heights police," reported WLS.
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First Posted: Jun 04, 2016 08:01 AM EDT
Now bats are the new threat for people in the US as they were found to spread rabies in human without an obvious bite. An elderly woman was reported to have died of rabies after her encounter with a rabid bat at her Wyoming home last August.
The elderly woman reportedly woke up in the middle of the night disturbed by a bat on her neck. She swatted it away and washed her hand before going to bed. Her husband caught the bat with gloves on his hands and said to have left it outside the house, according to NPR.
The couple didn't mind to call a doctor since she suffered no obvious bite wounds, reported Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) on Thursday. After a month the woman was allegedly hospitalized for eight days of mystery illness. That is when the woman's family is said to have remembered the bat incident happened a month ago.
Lab tests were carried out immediately to detect rabies infection, which turned out to be positive. Earlier the doctors were said to have mistaken the respiratory failure, weakness and slurred speech experienced by the woman for Guillain-Barre syndrome.
The woman's family members and 22 health care workers were then given post exposure treatment for rabies. Had the woman visited the doctor earlier, she could have been saved and the exposure to other people could have been contained. Lack of awareness on potential risk of rabies by bats caused the family to lose a life.
"Lack of referral to guidance concerning health risks associated with bats living in the home was possibly a missed opportunity to prevent rabies infection," public health officials noted.
Meanwhile, a bat caught in Arlington Heights tested positive for rabies. It was then transferred to Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) after the results were out on Wednesday. IDPH noted that the bats are active during warm weather and around 97 bats tested positive for rabies in 2015, noted ABC.
"A live bat trapped in a northwest suburban Arlington Heights home last week has tested positive for rabies. Animal control officers were called to the house in the 400 block of North Haddow Avenue on May 27 after a bat was captured inside, according to a statement from Arlington Heights police," reported WLS.
See Now: NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone