Why don't rabies infected humans act like rabies infected animals
Why don't rabies infected humans act like rabies infected animals
This always puzzled me. Why don't humans act much more aggressive or crazed like its often depicted with animals. Afaik there's 2 types of rabies, "dumb" and "furious" so my question is more towards the 2nd type. For example, we never hear of rabies causing a human to accidentally bite another human so why is that?
Humans have a highly developed prefrontal cortex that allows them to suppress their own impulses through conscious will.
Humans don’t attack people when rabid because they know it’s wrong to do.
From what I've heard, humans just aren't terribly bitey. Seeing videos of kids with rabies is terribly sad, but does give some insight into it. More fear than anything else.
It's a terrible disease and a terrible way to die. If you get bitten or scratched by an animal, or even if you wake up to a bat in your house, you should immediately get the rabies vaccine, as even a microscratch from a bat can give you rabies. As far as diseases go, I'd say it's probably up there with ebola in terms of suffering. At least ebola kills you quickly even as your insides melt.
So is there another animal that doesn't bite when infected with rabies?
Bats actually. They seem to be carriers of the disease but don't seem to be affected by it themselves, but they might still scratch you or bite you through normal behavior.
Although fortunately not a lot because they're not particularly aggressive. Mostly they just ignore humans as they tend to be out of reach and we're far too slow to be able to really do anything to them.
Now I'm wondering if there are documented cases of other primates being infected by rabies...
For one rabies is super rare in humans. When symptoms begin to show in humans they either die soon after or are sedated until they die. Some do rage, but again rare disease and quick death means you don't really get to see rage happening.
If you ever get a bite from a animal please get a rabies jab. Stray dog get a jab, bat hell yeah get a shot, dog tied done at the grocery store get a shot.
Rabies is seriously deathly.
Mouse bit me on my wedding night last month. My dumbass snatched him out of a trash can instead of just dumping. I may have had a few drinks. Didn't get a whole drop of blood out of me, but he got under the skin.
Next day, I'm seriously sweating it. OK, time to do a little research. Rabies reports around here are astonishingly rare, especially given the nature of the area. 1 in my county for all of 2023 so far. Still...
Found out that not only is rabies crazy rare in rats, mice and lagomorphs, there are no known instances of transmission to a human. I had no idea!
It's unfortunate that the shot series can run you $50k in the US if you don't have insurance or your insurance is run by assholes.
One person needed the shot and was told they had 10 days initially so were not super worried. They were then told by the heath department they actually only had three days to do it. The health department referred them to a hospital. The hospital said since it happened where it did, they would need to go to a different hospital. That hospital did not have the shot. The initial hospital was reluctant to provide it because it was expensive but eventually caved and gave it to them.
I agree: get the shot. But don't expect it to necessarily be easy.
Australia is totally rabies-free so I didn't know rabies even existed until I moved to the USA.
There's only two people who survived rabies. One was frozen to 0.000001HP for a long period, and the other literally died.
Uneducated Opinion: Because our higher brain functions can surpress fight/flight better than most animals. It’s the same reason jumpscare movies generally don’t turn theaters into a real-life bloodbath.
By the time rabies has gotten far enough to override that, the nervous system is basically gone and we’re dead.
I think this explains it right here. As another commenter said "more fear than anything else". Animals act very differently than humans when they are scared, they often get very aggressive. Anecdotally, when I was younger my loving smush of a dog got hit by a car and I ran over to her and she bit the shit out of me. She was scared for her life, and that's just how her brain was wired to react.
And just so I don't leave anybody feeling awful, she made it to the vet, needed a pin in her hip, and her tail was amputated, but she went on to live to the ripe old age of 15. My bites weren't too bad because she was a small dog. No stitches needed, but I have some tiny scars left if you look really close
But if you want to feel angry about the situation, it was a cop car that she was hit by which was flying down a residential street, and the cop yelled at me and my mother and threatened to give us a ticket for having a dog off the leash. And thus my hatred for police began at the age of 10.
It seems like a simple explanation, but the history of biology is pretty much the history of thinking we we're special and then finding out we were wrong, over and over again.
Ah the "insects don't feel pain" era. Nowadays we know that bugs can recognize human faces. Nobody knows why, they just can.
I think it's because humans don't fight much with their mouths. We mostly fight with our arms and more rarely bite and rabies just promotes hyper aggressiveness, of which, these symptoms are exhibited in infected humans.
If restrained instead of sedated a human does get very aggressive, flailing their arms, screaming and hurling insults, even at loved ones and family members. I think given the opportunity there would be some biting, but less often than animals, because again, humans primarily use their arms for violence.
Humans rarely bite as a defensive option. Animals bite when they are scared, humans tend to throw punches.
Rabies doesn't make you bite, it makes you scared, confused and uncomfortable and aggressive, so you fight.
Humans rarely bite as a defensive option.
Tell that to fucking Kyle from Mrs. Ventura's second grade class.
Oh hey you also got bit by a kid in 2nd grade? I punched the kid that did it to me. Walk in the next day and get sent to the principals office. When I told them why I did it they tried looking for teeth marks to prove it. A solid 16 hours later.
Damn bureaucrats
Kyle. Humans rarely bite as a defensive option. Next time do the patriotic American thing and shoot your fellow elementary school students.
See also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preparedness_101%3A_Zombie_Apocalypse
And:
... the generation of a “Zombie virus” cannot be firmly excluded according to the currently available biological evidence ... In keeping with this conjecture, an interesting simulation of an imaginary Zombie outbreak reveals that most of the US population would turn into Zombies within one week from appearance of the first case ... the transformation of Rabies virus into a “Zombie virus” will always remain a tangible threat surrounding human future
Humans don’t rely on instincts nearly as much as the typical animals you’d see infected with rabies. It’s pretty rare to hear of someone being injured by a human bite because we’re not made for that, other animals use teeth as a primary weapon.
The rabies virus wasn’t meant to transfer via humans, are just unfortunately affected by it because of similarities in biology
If anyone wants to know what the virus does to the brain, the Institute of Human Anatomy on yt has a good video on it. It takes a lot of information from Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolical Virus which was an interesting read (or listen, if you’re into that!)
My sister used to regularly bite me when she was angry. In her teens. No she's not mentally disabled. 🤷
Make sure she’s vaccinated!