Really? That's pretty cool!
Is it really? Tell me, how cool is this, Ms. Optimism and Sunshine?
Woman who found bat gets rabies shots
11:39 PM, Jun. 26, 2012 |
Written by
Nicole C. Brambila
The Desert Sun
LA QUINTA — Nancy Aguayo regularly swims laps in her pool.
But Sunday's workout was no ordinary one. She said she had come up from the water for a quick break to enjoy the sun on her face when she saw a dead bat floating in the pool next to her.
“With all the news about bats, I was so alarmed,” Aguayo, who lives in the La Quinta cove, said Tuesday. “Being a Sunday, it was just awful because I couldn't get ahold of anyone.”
Fearing the bat could be rabid, Aguayo decided to get vaccinated. She started the first in a series of costly and painful shots that are administered over a two-week period. A dose of the Imovax rabies vaccine costs $250 retail, according to the Indio Medical Pharmacy.
La Quinta Animal Services picked up the bat, which is being tested for rabies. A rabies test can be done within a couple of hours, but results may lag several days, depending on which facility conducts the test and when.
The wait time on rabies test results is not critical, health officials have said, because the incubation period can be as little as a week or as along as a year.
Worldwide, rabies kills more than 55,000 people a year, most in Third World countries, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Human rabies cases in the U.S. have become somewhat rare, having declined from 100 or more each year to fewer than three, according to the CDC. Animal control and vaccination programs started in the 1940s are largely credited for the decline.
There were three cases of human rabies in the U.S. in 2011, one each in New York, New Jersey and California, where an 8-year-old Humboldt County girl was exposed to the disease through a cat.
“I've never had to give the shot,” said Dr. Frank Curry, an emergency medicine physician at JFK Memorial. “It's very unusual to get bitten. It's a valid fear in Third World countries where animals are not vaccinated.”
Every year, it is estimated that 40,000 persons receive a rabies prevention treatment because of potential exposure, according to the CDC.
The wild animals that get rabies include raccoons, skunks, foxes and bats. Most people, however, are exposed to rabies from cats or dogs.
The bat Aguayo found is the second dead one discovered in the city in less than a week. A dead bat was found June 19 on the sidewalk at PGA West. It tested negative for rabies.
The La Quinta discoveries come in the wake of a number of dead bats reported in Southern California communities in recent weeks. To date, Riverside County has picked up 20 dead Mexican free-tailed bats, the kind most commonly found in this area.
Health officials do not know what is killing the bats, which can live up to 20 years. Although the number is twice as high as normal, the bat deaths fall within normal annual ranges.
It's all cool until those Poor Ingalls Girls go for a swim at the local pond, only to return home with enough saliva pouring out of their mouths to fill Papa Ingalls' shotgun barrel.