Rabies: Teen first to survive without shot

Dr Charles Rupprecht of the disease control agency called the recovery ‘‘historic’’. But even the doctors who took care of the girl said the result would have to be duplicated elsewhere before the therapy could be considered a cure or a treatment.

‘‘You have to see this therapy repeated successfully in another patient,’’ said Dr Rodney Willoughby, Associate Professor of Pediatrics who prescribed the cocktail of medicines for the sick girl, Jeanna Giese, 15. ‘‘Until then, it is a miracle.’’ Jeanna was bitten by a bat at a church service on September 12. She did not visit a doctor and so was not vaccinated, as is standard medical practice for such an exposure.

‘‘As society has developed, people have forgotten the folklore about don’t play with stray animals, or stay away from bats,’’ Willoughby said. The bat drew blood, he added, but the bite was quick and small, so Jeanna thought she had just been scratched. Her fellow churchgoers assumed that only healthy bats could fly, so they picked it up after it flew into a window and threw it out the door.

On October 18, she was admitted to the hospital with fluctuating consciousness, slurred speech and other symptoms typical of full-blown rabies. Rabies is caused by a virus in secretions, like saliva, from an infected animal. The vaccine, which stimulates antibodies to the virus, eliminates the chance of getting the disease if it is administered within days after the initial exposure. Once symptoms develop, generally after a few weeks, the shots are much less effective. They are useless when the rabies is advanced, so doctors opted in Jeanna’s case for the experimental treatment.

Only a handful of people have recovered after developing even the earliest symptoms of rabies, and all of those were given the vaccine.

The technique of inducing comas has been used by neurologists in patients with large brain injuries from infection, injury or stroke. But it had not been tried for rabies. Jeanna’s doctors said they would not disclose which medicines they had used until publishing their findings in a medical journal.