Rabies facts for kids
Rabies is a neurotropic (referring to the nuerons) virus, viral zoonotic disease (can spread to humans by animals) that causes acute encephalitis.
Usually, people (and animals) die from it (it is fatal). There is no cure for it. People who are treated soon after becoming infected have a chance to survive.
The disease is transmitted through the saliva and the blood. The usual form of getting it is a bite of a rabid mammal. Pets, like dogs need to be vaccinated against it, in most countries.
Treatment
There is no cure for Rabies. There is a vaccine (medicine to try to prevent rabies) against it. The vaccine was first developed by Louis Pasteur and Pierre Paul Émile Roux in 1885. This vaccine used a live virus grown in rabbits, and weakened (through drying it). The first person to be vaccinated was Joseph Meister (a 9-year-old boy who had been bitten by a dog). Vaccines similar to this are still used today, but other vaccines (growing the virus using cell cultures) are more used.
There is also a form of treatment that can be done once a person has been bitten. It needs to be done within 6 days of being bitten. There is no way to know whether someone is infected, until it's too late. Treatment starts with washing the wound. This is done to reduce the number of virus particles that enter the body. Often patients are given one dose of immunoglobulin and a certain number of vaccines, over a determined period of time, usually a month.
- CDC. Human-to-human transmission of rabies via a corneal transplant -- France. MMWR 1980;29:25-6
Images for kids
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Rendering of the rabies virus
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An electron microscope image of rabies virus.
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Commemorative stamp for Dr. Joseph Lennox Pawan, who isolated the rabies virus
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Two dogs with the paralytic, or dumb, form of rabies
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Rabies cases in humans and domestic animals — United States, 1938–2018
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Miniature of the Cantiga #275 depicting two monks hospitaller with rabies being carried before St. Mary of Terena.
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François Boissier de Sauvages de Lacroix, Della natura e causa della rabbia (Dissertation sur la nature et la cause de la Rage), 1777
See also
In Spanish: Rabia para niños
