Rabies resurfaces again ?
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, September 11 2013:
A 65 year old man from Yairipok Poirou Khongjil Awang Leikai, Imphal East has been infected with a disease whose symptoms are almost similar to those of rabies.
A medicine doctor attending to the man at JN Hospital informed The Sangai Express that all the symptoms are indicative of rabies infection.
The man was admitted to JN Hospital last Monday and he is currently undergoing treatment at the hospital's male medicine ward.
The first time the man was brought to the hospital, he was administered anti-fever drugs.
But since yesterday, the man showed clear signs of hydrophobia and every time he saw water.
Taking a cue from these symptoms, doctors asked family members if there was a case of dog bite.
At first, they replied in the negative.
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But after recollecting for some moments, one of the family members said that the man was once scratched by a pet pocket dog about three/four months back.
Not long after the dog was brought home, it became wild and mad.
In the efforts to capture it for medical treatment, the dog bit a child and scratched the man on the thumb.
Fearing that rabies virus might have been communicated because of the scratching, blood was squeezed out from the scratched thumb, recounted the worried family.
The particular doctor said that the condition and symptoms of the patient all point to rabies.
The doctor further informed that the patient has been referred to RIMS isolation ward for there is no isolation ward in JN Hospital.
The patient is undergoing treatment in RIMS isolation ward in critical condition.
Even as all the symptoms shown by the man are indicative of rabies, it has not been offically confirmed till this evening.
RIMS doctors have collected blood samples and they would send it to a qualified medical laboratory to confirm whether the infection is really rabies or not.
One Narahari, a cousin of the patient said that the dog was a small one which was not even one year old.
Even as it bit a child, it has no effect on the child for he was administered anti-rabies drugs on time.
The dog died three days after it bit the boy and scratched the man.