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Teen infected with rabies dies
13/05/2006 08:25 - (SA)
Houston - A teenager stricken with rabies he likely contracted when a bat flew into his bedroom and bit him has died, according to a media report.
The boy had been in an induced coma for several days at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston when he succumbed on Friday, the Houston Chronicle reported.
He began showing rabies symptoms last week. Doctors suspect the teen was infected several weeks earlier when a bat flew through his open bedroom window and bit him as he slept.
Doctors had been using an experimental treatment of sedatives and antiviral drugs on the teenager. The treatment had been credited with saving the life of a Wisconsin girl, making her the first unvaccinated human on record to survive rabies.
Rabies is usually fatal in humans once symptoms occur. The viral disease is rare in humans, averaging about three cases each year in the United States and about 55 000 annually worldwide.
- AP
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