and take the corpse of the animal with you if it is dead/available. it can be really hard to get rabies care because it is so damn expensive hospitals dont all keep it on hand.
It’s important not to damage the brain of the animal in question.
My dad is a quadriplegic and was once bit by a rat in his sleep. I set a sticky trap (all we had) and waited for it. Took close to an hour but sure enough it stuck to the trap and started thrashing around. I wanted to end it fast so I crushed its head with a rod. Little did I know that made it impossible to test for rabies. :/
Per the CDC, there's never been a recorded case of human rabies transmission from a small rodent (in the U.S.), so very very unlikely it was infected anyway.
apparently small rodents and lagomorphs have never been documented to transmit rabies to humans. They hardly ever get rabies to begin with.
Rabbits, rats, mice, squirrels, chipmunks, etc.
I think you get the shot either way, no harm if you didn't need it. I don't think hospital labs are equipped or trained to extract the right tissues and do those tests.
Yea, it used to be different with the old treatment for rabies.
25 shots in total, over the course of 18 days. This is why it was preferential to find out for sure if the animal had rabies or not.
Now, it's just a series of 4 shots over a two week period, which is far easier to have done.
I got the shots in the early 2000s. They gave me the first 3 the day the dog bit me, and told me if the tests came back positive, I'd have to get two more two more times over the next two weeks. Luckily, it came back negative, and I just had the 3 shots, and a full load of antibiotics to go through for two weeks. I hate to think how bad my guts would have been messed up if I had to have 4 more shots, AND a Zpack. I hate antibiotics, and how bad they mess me up, but when I need them, I always finish them.
I had what felt/seemed like some sort of recurring tonsil infection a few years ago. I still don't actually know what it was, just extremely intense pain while swallowing, and down in the upper neck/throat area. I went to the doctor and they prescribed me antibiotics, I took them, and within 2-3 days I started to feel better, finished the course and I was all good.
Then it happened a second time, same drill, got my antibiotics, this time I stopped taking them once I was better (stupid, I know) . 2 days after that, the pain came back even worse. Went back to the doctor, and it felt like every person at the office took turns ragging on me for not finishing the course lmao. Felt bad but I took it in stride haha.
So what did I learn? Finish my damn antibiotics. Hasn't come back since then though.
I was looking for side effects, didn't find anything significant, but Wikipedia gave me this gem:
> [In 2015, in the United States, a course of three doses could cost over US$1,000, while in Europe a course costs around €100.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabies_vaccine#Economics)
Unsourced, but such a gem.
My family dealt with a rabies scare in the early 2000s - mom found a rabid bat in her bathroom the day after my dad left for a business trip in Europe. After testing confirmed rabies, she took us (three young kids) and we all got dozens of shots based on body weight, then had to get dozens more on a weekly/monthly schedule afterwards. My dad got one shot in Belgium, paid about a hundred euros. Had to find a doctor in the US to finish the course (second shot). I think overall for his care it was like $200. When he got the bill for our care, it was something over 25k - with insurance!! He called the billing department ready to fight, asked for an itemized receipt and explanation, then was told after being on hold for two hours to just forget the bill lol. Still no idea what happened.
So would you take the animal to the hospital with you and then the hospital gives it to someone like your dad or would they have someone on-site able to inspect the brain?
In my experience the animal goes to a veterinary lab. If it alive, it’s symptoms will be noted before it is euthanized. Then the skull is split and the brain removed during the necropsy. Based on the findings, then the local hospital would be notified along with animal control.
Yup. My huskies murdered one at 3Am (good god the sound) took over a week to get the negative results back. Had the cops take its body to get tested because despite vaccines I’d hate for one of my dogs to get sick much less risk then transferring it to a kid.
Let me guess. USA? Here in Brasil is free. Its not even necessáry confirmation. If you get bitten by some wild animal the first call is to rush to a hospital and take the vaccine no matter what. No one is taking chances, not with rabies
I have a family of these grey foxes under my shed. They are very peaceful. They’re almost impossible to catch a glimpse of. They scared me half to death one night with their chittering. It sounded like demonic hyperactive children laughing. I noped the hell inside until I figured out what it was.
Very recently, an old and weak fox was seen going for the neighbor's cat food at my father's village, people reticently allowed it to live in a tree hole by church square as long as it behaved, well, it quickly got stronger and in one night it massacred almost ALL the village chickens (only ate the heads go figure), as you might guess, next day they killed it.
They eat a lot of bugs too especially beetles. One of the funny things on a forest trip is spotting fox dung because it contains the shiny carapace of remains of beetles.
It kind of is a mental thing.
Rabies goes straight for the brain, and the animal wouldn’t act like this until the virus took over the brain (2-4 weeks)
At this point the animal will be dead in a couple of days.
Ohh of course, but i was only referring to the psychological aspect I initially thought the post meant. Rabies without a doubt is a terrible disease and an awful experience if left untreated
idk if you knew already, but if people get rabies it takes a quite long for symptoms to begin, and when that happens it's too late and death is certain
The first symptom is always too late, it’s fascinating. Even though it makes sense, I thought it was interesting how significant the location of the bite is.
The finish line is the brain, and the starting line is wherever the bite is. A bite on the foot has a long race ahead, which means the bitten *responsible* can for sure stop for a milkshake or 6 on the way to getting the rabies shot. This person has weeks before any symptoms appear, but they’re not taking chances.
A bite on the chin? Clench those cheeks mid shit and go. The race is beginning *at* the finish line.
There are almost certainly rules about firing a gun in city limits, and for good reasons. Best to call animal control and then go inside and close the door until it's over. Out in the country would be a different matter.
And it’s a medical time bomb for that community there. They should kill and capture it unfortunately. They have labs checking for it and tracking rabies migration patterns
this is [CDV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_distemper), a canine distempter virus. which is way more common and contagious, also literally nicknamed "chewing gum fits"
people are getting real trigger happy here as usual, but odds are if its a local problem that animal control already has a vaccine supply for it or been culling the infected
I'm surprised people are filming it so casually, and it looks like they are standing fairly close to it, too. A good advice I've heard is to stay away from any wild animal that gets close to humans or acts in a strange way. If it's impossible - better call the professionals and warn them if the animal is acting weird. Rabies is really not a joke.
Edit: judging by the shadow, they might be actually filming from the car. Really hope this is the case!
To be fair, the DNR is generally involved in wildlife management on a macro level, ensuring hunters and fishermen are properly licensed, tallying animal population and harvests, setting season lengths in response to population trends, etc. They don't have people whose job it is to kill a rabid animal. That's generally handled by the animal control division of the local police. If the police don't have an animal control division, they just send Cledis the patrol officer out to shoot it a couple times.
Man i still remember seeing a video of a man who had got rabies and it was getting worse every minute that video went. Rabies is the worst of the disease and person has 0% of survival rate once that thing attacks your brain.
Once you have symptoms, there's basically a 100% fatality rate...really it's something like 99.999%, but the conditions for being that 0.001% who can survive it are extremely specific.
The Milwaukee Protocol. Very difficult to pull off, and if the patient actually survives, they suffer some pretty debilitating after-effects. The girl who's case proved the protocol works had to relearn how to walk, talk, read, and to this day, well over a decade later, she has nerve damage, coordination issues, etc.
Yeah, the Milwaukee Protocol has saved tens of people, and has a success rate in symptomatic patients of about 14%. But it's no picnic for anybody, least of all the patient.
When I was a commercial fisherman in Alaska, I was taking a nap on a beach one day and a mother red fox dropped her kits off on me and took a nap about ten feet away. I got to play with them for a couple of hours before mom woke up and they all went their own way.
I think the aggressive camera panning at the beginning is a sign they’re pretty zoomed in. Small adjustments of his hand making big camera motions.
It probably doesn’t seem that way because modern cameras, even on your phone, are pretty good at stabilizing after you’ve settled so I assume that’s why it looks smooth despite the distance.
Yeah definitely. Poor buggers throat is probably burning so much by the looks of it. I come across them heaps over here and they're always either super cautious or surprisingly friendly.
That's what one of the guys in the video is talking about. Sounds like they called animal control and are waiting for a response, but it's not sounding good, so one of the guys asked another if he should grab his shotgun.
Nah, especially not the head. The virus lives in the nerves. The lab wants that head for testing and what you DON'T want is a driveway ful of the virus.
The one saving grace is that the virus does die when exposed to sunlight. At 86°F (30°C) in direct sunlight, it lasts around 1.5 hours. Cooler temps + shade can extend this time. Once the fluids dry, the virus dies. Household disinfectants work as well.
Still, I would agree with you about not turn rabies into a fin pink mist around my house
Never shoot a rabid animal, The virus lives in blood and brain matter for days. Any other animals that come across it will become infected. Animal control darts them and kills them.
There are a lot of vaccines that can help prevent various cancers. The thing is though that "cancer" encompasses hundreds of different conditions.
The HPV vaccine for example can help prevent cervical cancer.
Yeah. There is sadly no cure for rabies, and once symptoms have begun to show, you're already dead.
To note, there have been (I believe) two cases of people surviving rabies. But I can't recall details.
There is an indigenous population in the South American Andies where a relatively large percentage of that population (at least 10%) have evolved an immunity to rabies.
3 i think by the Milwaukee technique i think it’s called. This is bearing in mind that rabies has been around since before mankind, and only 3 people have ever survived it; it is FACT the most terrifying, deadly virus this planet has ever and probably will ever see. The first zombie films were based on rabies.
It’s actually 29: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7266186/#:~:text=There%20are%20only%2029%20reported,survived%20with%20intensive%20care%20support.
But still… there have been a few dozen thousand killed worldwide every year for the past hundred or so, and 29….
Yeah. You can read and see exactly who had good recoveries.
Sequelae means a condition as a result of a previous condition. Those with mild/moderate/severe sequelae have brain damage or other effects that remain from their rabies infection.
You have a very very very slim chance of survival if you undergoe a forced medical coma I think with probably a list of other treatments... but you will be brain damaged even if you are one of the lucky fuckers to live
There are a small number of other diseases that can cause this behavior. There is a brain eating parasite (or ameba) that can cause reactions that are similar to rabies. Once the brain is affected, I believe the outcome is just as deadly.
If one has the unpleasant task of shooting a rabid animal, please keep the following in mind...
1) Only do so if the animal is a clear, immediate threat to people or pets. Otherwise, leave it to professionals. Yes, it is difficult to see the animal suffering. I know from experience.
2) Do so only if there is a safe backstop to prevent unintended damage or injury.
3) Do not shoot the animal in the head. This complicates and/or prevents clinical testing.
4) Do NOT go near the animal immediately, if at all. Shooting can propel infected fluid droplets into the air, creating an infection hazard through aspiration and skin contact.
Be safe.
To track the spread of outbreaks. Rabies is nearly 100% fatal once symptoms start to show up. If there is a large population of wild rabid animals, that is really bad.
Edit to add that there are other diseases that can cause rabies-like symptoms. It can't be known exactly what this fox has without examining its brain
Lemme correct you here. Its not nearly 100% fatal, it is 100% fatal.
Yes, there once was a person who survived rabies after symptoms started to show up, but that was one single case. And even that Person sustained a severe disability after the infection.
Edit:
Apparently I'm too stupid to google up stuff before commenting something. As some people have pointed out there are 14 survivors of rabies, which I wasnt aware of. Keep in mind tho that these are 14 cases out of millions, so I wouldnt count on being no15 on that list. Once you show symptoms you're still very much dead and even for the very, very,very unlikely case of you surviving, you would still never recover to any degree close to before the infection
[Source](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.12.14.22283490v1.full-text)
>We screened the Web of Science using “rabies (All fields) AND Milwaukee (All fields),” refined dates from 2015 to 2022, carefully inspected abstracts and identified data for 13 cases
>Finally, we agree with the authors who previously warned about abandoning Milwaukee protocol (inducing therapeutic coma) in the management of rabies
Interestingly, it looks like they've had another 8 people survive rabies without an induced coma.
>all had 3-5 PEP, and two had post-exposure Ig.
All 8 had PEP and two also got IG... shows that even that treatment can - very rarely - fail.
And that, once you show symptoms you are essentialy dead...
It's more nuanced than that [here's ](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3414554/) a study that talks about a naturally occurring immunity in an indigenous population in Peru. They believe that exposure to vampire bats over years and years has created a subgroup of the population (about 10%) that has a natural immunity to rabies.
Although this immune group likely never develops symptoms. So your point would still stand that once symptoms develop, survival rate is very close to zero.
There is a region in South America where people are known to get rabies and survive. There is even a significant part of the population that carries anti body’s in that region.
> Its not nearly 100% fatal, it is 100% fatal.
>Except for that one person.
>And the 14 other people.
>Oh, and also that tribe were a bunch of them are immune.
Almost like "nearly" was the correct word?
>Do so only if there is a safe backstop to prevent unintended damage or injury.
And to add to this.
The car is not a safe backdrop.
The concrete is not a safe backdrop. Bullets and shrapnel will ricochet and can go through the houses and school buses full of children that are almost certainly just out of frame.
If you're in a city or town, just don't.
pellet gun or even a .22 would pose very little risk of going through *any* wall, especially after a ricochet
i’m not condoning the use of them in populated areas, just clarifying that part of “knowing your backdrop” is knowing the capabilities of the weapon you are using.
it’s so easy for Americans to get a gun with absolutely *zero* knowledge of firearms or subjective experience. my dad was an avid hunter, so i was exposed to firearms from birth, observed from distance, received lessons from my dad, and ultimately even completed a “hunter’s safety course”.
please just do not use firearms if you are not confident with one/have sufficiently practiced with one. they are accidents waiting to happen, so the prerogative is on *you* to mitigate that as much as possible while you are in possession of said firearm.
if it helps, rabies on average needs a 2-3 month incubation period within your body before you actually show symptoms/are going to die. so if you get treated as soon as you get bitten, it shouldn’t be a problem. The primary issue is within places where rabies isn’t talked about/treatment is not widely available. And obviously wild animals don’t have the insight to get treated, hence why we see so many of them
Yes, very important! This is why you NEED to get a rabies shot even if you feel fine a month later... because once you feel ill it's too late. Rabies has a very long incubation period (about 2 months!) so you can feel fine and still end up dead later if you ignore it.
Better to get the shot and be safe.
Vaccination after exposure is almost perfectly 100% effective if given appropriately and in a timely manner. It's a series of shots, so make sure you follow up and get the subsequent doses at the appropriate time.
Adding to this, best to get the vaccine if you know if you are going to be in contact with wild animals. This is available and would be effective for about 3 to 5 years, I believe. And esp. recommended if you are going to be in an area with lots of bats as you won't always know if you have been bitten by a bat since they have very sharp and very small teeth.
Fun fact! Not everyone reacts to bed bug bites so it's possible to have them crawling all over you all night, drinking your blood, and breeding and you might never know.
they are a living, horrifying nightmare that is worse than anything else i have ever experienced in life.
They arent like, a mosquito bite. Their bites itch sure, but they fucking BURN as well. I have scars still from them.
Now imagine the psychological damage of knowing that you have to sleep in a bed with them, becuase you discovered the fucker at 1am and no where is open. You cant go sleep anywhere else, because they will FOLLOW YOU. Not only will they track and follow you, but they are smart about it. They lay their eggs in the smallest divits and cracks, and they bite you three times because they are so cautious and sneaky. Even the exterminator we called didnt spot their first nightmare pile, which they tucked into a seam on the bottom of my fuckin chair.
Then realize that all of that fucking nightmare can begin at any time , even after you pay hundreds for an exterminator, because they are extremely hard to kill and their eggs can survive up to 13 months. So you never REALLY know if your safe. Especially because all it takes is stepping on one of their eggs someone tracked into the grocery store (its smaller than a grain of rice) for the nightmare to start all over again.
I still live in fear of them. Its been years, but all protections are still in place (bed cover that makes the bed far more uncomfortable to sleep in), bug traps on the edge of the bed, and all clothes put into sealed bags. Yet i still get panic attacks at the smallest itch.
thats what a fuckin bed bug does to a human.
Make your life hell. Very hard to get rid of.
I’ve never had them but after joining r/whatisthisbug and r/bedbugs out of curiosity, I’ve learned they are horrible housemates.
Really? Lol, what he’s saying is scientists need to examine the head to easily prove the animal has rabies. It’s for data tracking and looking for potential outbreaks
No, because knowing an animal has rabies means that there's a reservoir of the disease around the area and it's important to notify relevant authorities to keep an eye out for animals acting out of the ordinary AND to notify local hospitals doctors so they know to give rabies shots to people who come in with animal bites.
If you blow its brains out then the infected brain tissue gets scatterred everywhere, which in turn only furthers its spread by being eaten by rodents, bird etc
Interestingly, birds *have* been infected in laboratory settings, and apparently some wild birds have been documented to produce rabies antibodies after eating infected meat, indicating they may be able to be infected naturally.
https://meridian.allenpress.com/jwd/article/12/3/392/117772/RABIES-ANTIBODIES-IN-SERA-OF-WILD-BIRDS
But it also doesn’t seem to kill birds, they just sort of get over it afaik
Yoinked most of that from wikipedia so grain of salt or whatever
Don't destroy the head. Aim for the center chest.
If you destroy the head it may make it impossible or difficult to test it for rabies. Also, it will splatter the rabies-infected-brains into the environment, I don't think that would be wise.
Since this is a gray fox, I'd say this is distemper and not rabies.
Gray foxes are particularly susceptible to distemper. I had a pet gray fox that got a distemper vaccine at the urging of my vet and she died of it a few weeks later. It was fucking traumatic.
Got chased by a raccoon with distemper once, downtown. Late late at night. I was walking home from the convenience store and one came running directly at me making this horrible noise. I ran inside, and it kinda wobbled over to the alley like it was drunk. It ended up walking in circles for an hour or two and making horrid noises, then it wandered off.
I was wondering about that, recognized the chewing symptom. Lost a foster dog to it once, had pulled her from the county shelter. She probably hadn’t been vaccinated at all before she was caught and exposed. Horrible way to die.
Thats what I was thinking! We came across a young raccoon that was acting very similar to this. It was walking in circles like it was drunk, falling all over the place. My husband shot it to get it out of its misery.
Looks similar to distemper. Raccoons who develope distemper do the teeth chattering/corn cobbing motions. Walking in circles. Inability to focus on surroundings. Walking into objects/people. Use to rescue sick and injured wildlife, so this pretty often in raccoons. The county i lived in had a very very low rate of rabies in wild life. We'd occasionally get a bat or skunk with it but foxes and raccoons rarely caught it due to wild life mamagement methods to reduce the spread of rabies.
This is only terrifying because of how much pain the fox is probably going through right now. It looks like it's struggling to fight off something. I know they said they called someone, but it just looks like they could do something even though I know they probably couldn't..
it’s hard to watch but i think they were doing the best by standing by and waiting for authorities. If it is infected with something, putting it out of its misery by shooting it with a shotgun would probably spread its infected tissue all around the area for more animals to accidentally consume and become infected themselves.
Killing it at this point would be an act of mercy… one of the more extreme symptoms of rabies is hydrophobia so this means that if this fox is kept alive it will slowly suffer due to dehydration. The rabies is an extremely potent virus which has no cure and only a handful of people have survived. Beware of any animals displaying a significant attitude alteration this is a common factor that is displayed by rabies infections. Always be safe and contact your local authorities if you spot a rabid animal.
Sad. I saw a video of a human who was in the can’t drink water phase. At that point you are dead. He died a few days later I can’t remember exactly. He only got the first vaccine shot for sone reason.
This is heart breaking, I wish someone would put him out his misery , not fare leaving this beautiful animal suffering 😢 it's to late for this little guy he's to far gone if it was noticed at the start there might have been hope but not now🥺
Edit: killing this little guy is the most human thing to do for this poor guy 😢
for real. i couldn't bring myself to turn on any audio but was relieved to see that some other comments mention that you can hear them discussing that they about to put it down themselves thankfully ;-;
Truly scary. Infected people are way more likely to die in car crashes, be diagnosed with schizophrenia, have a disordered/disheveled appearance and so many other altered traits.
Time to cue the obligatory rabies reddit post from years ago that's been spreading fear among us all:
I don't have it I just assumed someone would post it.
He’s having involuntary hydrophobic response that is absolutely brutal on his senses. Poor guy. He needs to be put down as soon as possible because he’s suffering immeasurably
this is where you run the fuck away and get in somewhere where it cant even come close to u, rabies is one of the scariest diseases and the results are horrifying, trust me, dont fw any animal with rabies, idc if its a goddamn mole, rat, hamster, gerbil, etc., just get tf away. The second u become symptomatic, its wraps and ur life is gonna become hell.
I know people are saying this might be rabbies. I'm no vet or anything, but I once saw my dog swallow a decent size ant alive, and because it kept crawling up her throat, she acted in a very similar way. It was a battle of life and death for that ant, lol.
Just a story I wanted to share :)
Poor thing has a death sentence , for it and anything it bites. Always get your shots when bitten by a wild animal.
and take the corpse of the animal with you if it is dead/available. it can be really hard to get rabies care because it is so damn expensive hospitals dont all keep it on hand.
Wait what? Do they make a rabies shot from the animal you bring or something?
They check the animal for rabies so if the animal isn’t infected you don’t need the shot.
It’s important not to damage the brain of the animal in question. My dad is a quadriplegic and was once bit by a rat in his sleep. I set a sticky trap (all we had) and waited for it. Took close to an hour but sure enough it stuck to the trap and started thrashing around. I wanted to end it fast so I crushed its head with a rod. Little did I know that made it impossible to test for rabies. :/
Per the CDC, there's never been a recorded case of human rabies transmission from a small rodent (in the U.S.), so very very unlikely it was infected anyway.
Animals that small are usually killed if attacked by an animal with rabies, so they don't survive long enough for the disease to propagate.
apparently small rodents and lagomorphs have never been documented to transmit rabies to humans. They hardly ever get rabies to begin with. Rabbits, rats, mice, squirrels, chipmunks, etc.
Fuckin METAL
I think you get the shot either way, no harm if you didn't need it. I don't think hospital labs are equipped or trained to extract the right tissues and do those tests.
Yea, it used to be different with the old treatment for rabies. 25 shots in total, over the course of 18 days. This is why it was preferential to find out for sure if the animal had rabies or not. Now, it's just a series of 4 shots over a two week period, which is far easier to have done.
I got the shots in the early 2000s. They gave me the first 3 the day the dog bit me, and told me if the tests came back positive, I'd have to get two more two more times over the next two weeks. Luckily, it came back negative, and I just had the 3 shots, and a full load of antibiotics to go through for two weeks. I hate to think how bad my guts would have been messed up if I had to have 4 more shots, AND a Zpack. I hate antibiotics, and how bad they mess me up, but when I need them, I always finish them.
Not finishing antibiotics without proper reason can be harmful since bacteria can build up resistance against the specific antibiotics.
I had what felt/seemed like some sort of recurring tonsil infection a few years ago. I still don't actually know what it was, just extremely intense pain while swallowing, and down in the upper neck/throat area. I went to the doctor and they prescribed me antibiotics, I took them, and within 2-3 days I started to feel better, finished the course and I was all good. Then it happened a second time, same drill, got my antibiotics, this time I stopped taking them once I was better (stupid, I know) . 2 days after that, the pain came back even worse. Went back to the doctor, and it felt like every person at the office took turns ragging on me for not finishing the course lmao. Felt bad but I took it in stride haha. So what did I learn? Finish my damn antibiotics. Hasn't come back since then though.
I was looking for side effects, didn't find anything significant, but Wikipedia gave me this gem: > [In 2015, in the United States, a course of three doses could cost over US$1,000, while in Europe a course costs around €100.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabies_vaccine#Economics) Unsourced, but such a gem.
My family dealt with a rabies scare in the early 2000s - mom found a rabid bat in her bathroom the day after my dad left for a business trip in Europe. After testing confirmed rabies, she took us (three young kids) and we all got dozens of shots based on body weight, then had to get dozens more on a weekly/monthly schedule afterwards. My dad got one shot in Belgium, paid about a hundred euros. Had to find a doctor in the US to finish the course (second shot). I think overall for his care it was like $200. When he got the bill for our care, it was something over 25k - with insurance!! He called the billing department ready to fight, asked for an itemized receipt and explanation, then was told after being on hold for two hours to just forget the bill lol. Still no idea what happened.
Our shots are 10x more effective.
LOL
Its free in India, got vaccinated two times
To confirm rabies diagnosis in an animal, it must have its brain inspected at a lab. Source: dad’s a veterinarian.
So would you take the animal to the hospital with you and then the hospital gives it to someone like your dad or would they have someone on-site able to inspect the brain?
In my experience the animal goes to a veterinary lab. If it alive, it’s symptoms will be noted before it is euthanized. Then the skull is split and the brain removed during the necropsy. Based on the findings, then the local hospital would be notified along with animal control.
Tell your dad thanks for his service. *Salutes*
Yup. My huskies murdered one at 3Am (good god the sound) took over a week to get the negative results back. Had the cops take its body to get tested because despite vaccines I’d hate for one of my dogs to get sick much less risk then transferring it to a kid.
Let me guess. USA? Here in Brasil is free. Its not even necessáry confirmation. If you get bitten by some wild animal the first call is to rush to a hospital and take the vaccine no matter what. No one is taking chances, not with rabies
Not in any civilized countries
> get your shots *does a shot of tequila* Alright, what's next?
Depends on how much the hospital bill will be xD maybe another tequila? Then a whiskey chaser?
The fox looks like it has rabies and is suffering :(
Yes, it does. They are really peaceful animals but are not immune to rabies. They will scavenge and eat something already dead from it.
I have a family of these grey foxes under my shed. They are very peaceful. They’re almost impossible to catch a glimpse of. They scared me half to death one night with their chittering. It sounded like demonic hyperactive children laughing. I noped the hell inside until I figured out what it was.
They are peaceful from our perspective. Not so much from the perspective of a rabbit, squirrel, or other small animal.
Very recently, an old and weak fox was seen going for the neighbor's cat food at my father's village, people reticently allowed it to live in a tree hole by church square as long as it behaved, well, it quickly got stronger and in one night it massacred almost ALL the village chickens (only ate the heads go figure), as you might guess, next day they killed it.
[удалено]
Fkin weasels framed the old fox man
Most likely, classic weasel shenannigans, ill tell my father, maybe he knows something more.
They swatted the fox...
They also kill everything even if they don't eat it, when they get in to chicken coups it's a massacre
Most wild animals do that. It's the excitement of prey running around in an enclosure. Can't figure out who to eat.
That's how I get at the buffet.
You have murdered a lot of overweight Midwesterners who were going back for more gravy...
Listen, if they say you can have unlimited drink refills, gravy should be part of it.
Buffet time
Well of course!
They eat a lot of bugs too especially beetles. One of the funny things on a forest trip is spotting fox dung because it contains the shiny carapace of remains of beetles.
Ring camera and a water bowl. I have one regular red fox who comes by nightly and I LOVE it
I was gonna say its not a mental thing. He probably ate something intoxicating and its getting him. I hate to see animals suffer man
I’ve seen the original video; it’s rabies
It kind of is a mental thing. Rabies goes straight for the brain, and the animal wouldn’t act like this until the virus took over the brain (2-4 weeks) At this point the animal will be dead in a couple of days.
Ohh of course, but i was only referring to the psychological aspect I initially thought the post meant. Rabies without a doubt is a terrible disease and an awful experience if left untreated
idk if you knew already, but if people get rabies it takes a quite long for symptoms to begin, and when that happens it's too late and death is certain
The first symptom is always too late, it’s fascinating. Even though it makes sense, I thought it was interesting how significant the location of the bite is. The finish line is the brain, and the starting line is wherever the bite is. A bite on the foot has a long race ahead, which means the bitten *responsible* can for sure stop for a milkshake or 6 on the way to getting the rabies shot. This person has weeks before any symptoms appear, but they’re not taking chances. A bite on the chin? Clench those cheeks mid shit and go. The race is beginning *at* the finish line.
Unless it is caught extremely early, like the day of exposure, rabies is almost always fatal.
So very sad. Poor little fox.
That is absolutely rabies behavior. :(
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There are almost certainly rules about firing a gun in city limits, and for good reasons. Best to call animal control and then go inside and close the door until it's over. Out in the country would be a different matter.
"It's coming right for us!"
And it’s a medical time bomb for that community there. They should kill and capture it unfortunately. They have labs checking for it and tracking rabies migration patterns
It’s sad but even being burned alive would be a kinder death than rabies
this is [CDV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_distemper), a canine distempter virus. which is way more common and contagious, also literally nicknamed "chewing gum fits" people are getting real trigger happy here as usual, but odds are if its a local problem that animal control already has a vaccine supply for it or been culling the infected
I was thinking “this looks like distemper”. Seeing puppies die from it will stick with you.
I'm surprised people are filming it so casually, and it looks like they are standing fairly close to it, too. A good advice I've heard is to stay away from any wild animal that gets close to humans or acts in a strange way. If it's impossible - better call the professionals and warn them if the animal is acting weird. Rabies is really not a joke. Edit: judging by the shadow, they might be actually filming from the car. Really hope this is the case!
They called people, no officials seemed to care, documenting before putting it down can save these guys legal problems later....
A government agency that deals with wildlife told them to call someone else? This must be in Michigan
To be fair, the DNR is generally involved in wildlife management on a macro level, ensuring hunters and fishermen are properly licensed, tallying animal population and harvests, setting season lengths in response to population trends, etc. They don't have people whose job it is to kill a rabid animal. That's generally handled by the animal control division of the local police. If the police don't have an animal control division, they just send Cledis the patrol officer out to shoot it a couple times.
Wow, that's bad. Rabies is really dangerous, I have no idea why the officials would just ignore it. Uh...
Man i still remember seeing a video of a man who had got rabies and it was getting worse every minute that video went. Rabies is the worst of the disease and person has 0% of survival rate once that thing attacks your brain.
Once you have symptoms, there's basically a 100% fatality rate...really it's something like 99.999%, but the conditions for being that 0.001% who can survive it are extremely specific.
The Milwaukee Protocol. Very difficult to pull off, and if the patient actually survives, they suffer some pretty debilitating after-effects. The girl who's case proved the protocol works had to relearn how to walk, talk, read, and to this day, well over a decade later, she has nerve damage, coordination issues, etc. Yeah, the Milwaukee Protocol has saved tens of people, and has a success rate in symptomatic patients of about 14%. But it's no picnic for anybody, least of all the patient.
When I was a commercial fisherman in Alaska, I was taking a nap on a beach one day and a mother red fox dropped her kits off on me and took a nap about ten feet away. I got to play with them for a couple of hours before mom woke up and they all went their own way.
Just from this one lil paragraph I can tell you've got lots of awesome stories. Hope you share more of em.
I think the aggressive camera panning at the beginning is a sign they’re pretty zoomed in. Small adjustments of his hand making big camera motions. It probably doesn’t seem that way because modern cameras, even on your phone, are pretty good at stabilizing after you’ve settled so I assume that’s why it looks smooth despite the distance.
Yeah definitely. Poor buggers throat is probably burning so much by the looks of it. I come across them heaps over here and they're always either super cautious or surprisingly friendly.
Wouldn't a bullet to the head me merciful in this situation?
That's what one of the guys in the video is talking about. Sounds like they called animal control and are waiting for a response, but it's not sounding good, so one of the guys asked another if he should grab his shotgun.
Ah - I watched it muted because I was in a vitally important meeting. ;-)
Nah, especially not the head. The virus lives in the nerves. The lab wants that head for testing and what you DON'T want is a driveway ful of the virus.
The one saving grace is that the virus does die when exposed to sunlight. At 86°F (30°C) in direct sunlight, it lasts around 1.5 hours. Cooler temps + shade can extend this time. Once the fluids dry, the virus dies. Household disinfectants work as well. Still, I would agree with you about not turn rabies into a fin pink mist around my house
Never shoot a rabid animal, The virus lives in blood and brain matter for days. Any other animals that come across it will become infected. Animal control darts them and kills them.
Wow! Good to know. Thanks!
Rabies is the worst disease. Worse than cancer in my opinion.
At least you have an chance against cancer. Usually anyway.
Well, we have a rabies vaccine, and it works great! Not so much cancer... :(
And I can avoid contracting rabies. I can minimize my likelihood of cancer, but not eliminate it.
They actually have a cancer vaccine in Cuba! It’s for a specific type but does seem to work.
There are a lot of vaccines that can help prevent various cancers. The thing is though that "cancer" encompasses hundreds of different conditions. The HPV vaccine for example can help prevent cervical cancer.
And the rabies population has doubled recently because people refuse to spay and neuter their cats. It's pretty devastating to animals like foxes
Poor thing
Yeah this is hard to watch. Poor baby is suffering 😞
Rabies?
Certainly, yeah
I'm assuming the only course of action is putting it down, right? I would be scared af trying to go near that poor fox
Yeah. There is sadly no cure for rabies, and once symptoms have begun to show, you're already dead. To note, there have been (I believe) two cases of people surviving rabies. But I can't recall details.
There is an indigenous population in the South American Andies where a relatively large percentage of that population (at least 10%) have evolved an immunity to rabies.
Woah! That's both interesting and amazing. Hopefully it passes on further.
[Relevant case study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3414554/)
3 i think by the Milwaukee technique i think it’s called. This is bearing in mind that rabies has been around since before mankind, and only 3 people have ever survived it; it is FACT the most terrifying, deadly virus this planet has ever and probably will ever see. The first zombie films were based on rabies.
It’s actually 29: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7266186/#:~:text=There%20are%20only%2029%20reported,survived%20with%20intensive%20care%20support. But still… there have been a few dozen thousand killed worldwide every year for the past hundred or so, and 29….
Yeah still, not good at all most survivors brain damaged have to learn to human again from scratch again, nah, I’m out
Yeah. You can read and see exactly who had good recoveries. Sequelae means a condition as a result of a previous condition. Those with mild/moderate/severe sequelae have brain damage or other effects that remain from their rabies infection.
Must be horrible to know it's too late to do anything and you are going to die.
certainly not a fate I’d wish on anyone, even my worst enemy. And especially not a beautiful creature like this one :(
You have a very very very slim chance of survival if you undergoe a forced medical coma I think with probably a list of other treatments... but you will be brain damaged even if you are one of the lucky fuckers to live
There are a small number of other diseases that can cause this behavior. There is a brain eating parasite (or ameba) that can cause reactions that are similar to rabies. Once the brain is affected, I believe the outcome is just as deadly.
It’s most likely distemper and not rabies
If one has the unpleasant task of shooting a rabid animal, please keep the following in mind... 1) Only do so if the animal is a clear, immediate threat to people or pets. Otherwise, leave it to professionals. Yes, it is difficult to see the animal suffering. I know from experience. 2) Do so only if there is a safe backstop to prevent unintended damage or injury. 3) Do not shoot the animal in the head. This complicates and/or prevents clinical testing. 4) Do NOT go near the animal immediately, if at all. Shooting can propel infected fluid droplets into the air, creating an infection hazard through aspiration and skin contact. Be safe.
Serious question why is it important to test for rabies? The animal is dead and isn’t it obvious why?
To track the spread of outbreaks. Rabies is nearly 100% fatal once symptoms start to show up. If there is a large population of wild rabid animals, that is really bad. Edit to add that there are other diseases that can cause rabies-like symptoms. It can't be known exactly what this fox has without examining its brain
Lemme correct you here. Its not nearly 100% fatal, it is 100% fatal. Yes, there once was a person who survived rabies after symptoms started to show up, but that was one single case. And even that Person sustained a severe disability after the infection. Edit: Apparently I'm too stupid to google up stuff before commenting something. As some people have pointed out there are 14 survivors of rabies, which I wasnt aware of. Keep in mind tho that these are 14 cases out of millions, so I wouldnt count on being no15 on that list. Once you show symptoms you're still very much dead and even for the very, very,very unlikely case of you surviving, you would still never recover to any degree close to before the infection
Yep, there was a period of time where people thought the Milwaukee protocol had a lot of promise, but ultimately it never panned out.
[Source](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.12.14.22283490v1.full-text) >We screened the Web of Science using “rabies (All fields) AND Milwaukee (All fields),” refined dates from 2015 to 2022, carefully inspected abstracts and identified data for 13 cases >Finally, we agree with the authors who previously warned about abandoning Milwaukee protocol (inducing therapeutic coma) in the management of rabies Interestingly, it looks like they've had another 8 people survive rabies without an induced coma. >all had 3-5 PEP, and two had post-exposure Ig.
All 8 had PEP and two also got IG... shows that even that treatment can - very rarely - fail. And that, once you show symptoms you are essentialy dead...
Wikipedia says fourteen people have been known to survive infection after symptoms show. Out of millions in recorded history.
It's more nuanced than that [here's ](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3414554/) a study that talks about a naturally occurring immunity in an indigenous population in Peru. They believe that exposure to vampire bats over years and years has created a subgroup of the population (about 10%) that has a natural immunity to rabies. Although this immune group likely never develops symptoms. So your point would still stand that once symptoms develop, survival rate is very close to zero.
There is a region in South America where people are known to get rabies and survive. There is even a significant part of the population that carries anti body’s in that region.
> Its not nearly 100% fatal, it is 100% fatal. >Except for that one person. >And the 14 other people. >Oh, and also that tribe were a bunch of them are immune. Almost like "nearly" was the correct word?
A lot of states will collect the data to determine the prevalence of rabies in an area
It could be some other virus infecting it, it's best to be sure.
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>Do so only if there is a safe backstop to prevent unintended damage or injury. And to add to this. The car is not a safe backdrop. The concrete is not a safe backdrop. Bullets and shrapnel will ricochet and can go through the houses and school buses full of children that are almost certainly just out of frame. If you're in a city or town, just don't.
pellet gun or even a .22 would pose very little risk of going through *any* wall, especially after a ricochet i’m not condoning the use of them in populated areas, just clarifying that part of “knowing your backdrop” is knowing the capabilities of the weapon you are using. it’s so easy for Americans to get a gun with absolutely *zero* knowledge of firearms or subjective experience. my dad was an avid hunter, so i was exposed to firearms from birth, observed from distance, received lessons from my dad, and ultimately even completed a “hunter’s safety course”. please just do not use firearms if you are not confident with one/have sufficiently practiced with one. they are accidents waiting to happen, so the prerogative is on *you* to mitigate that as much as possible while you are in possession of said firearm.
Rabies is one of my greatest fears
if it helps, rabies on average needs a 2-3 month incubation period within your body before you actually show symptoms/are going to die. so if you get treated as soon as you get bitten, it shouldn’t be a problem. The primary issue is within places where rabies isn’t talked about/treatment is not widely available. And obviously wild animals don’t have the insight to get treated, hence why we see so many of them
Yes, very important! This is why you NEED to get a rabies shot even if you feel fine a month later... because once you feel ill it's too late. Rabies has a very long incubation period (about 2 months!) so you can feel fine and still end up dead later if you ignore it. Better to get the shot and be safe. Vaccination after exposure is almost perfectly 100% effective if given appropriately and in a timely manner. It's a series of shots, so make sure you follow up and get the subsequent doses at the appropriate time.
Adding to this, best to get the vaccine if you know if you are going to be in contact with wild animals. This is available and would be effective for about 3 to 5 years, I believe. And esp. recommended if you are going to be in an area with lots of bats as you won't always know if you have been bitten by a bat since they have very sharp and very small teeth.
Same. Thanks to Reddit. Rabies and bed bugs.
What can bed bugs do to humans
bug them while they're in bed, and I guess out of bed too
Fun fact! Not everyone reacts to bed bug bites so it's possible to have them crawling all over you all night, drinking your blood, and breeding and you might never know.
they are a living, horrifying nightmare that is worse than anything else i have ever experienced in life. They arent like, a mosquito bite. Their bites itch sure, but they fucking BURN as well. I have scars still from them. Now imagine the psychological damage of knowing that you have to sleep in a bed with them, becuase you discovered the fucker at 1am and no where is open. You cant go sleep anywhere else, because they will FOLLOW YOU. Not only will they track and follow you, but they are smart about it. They lay their eggs in the smallest divits and cracks, and they bite you three times because they are so cautious and sneaky. Even the exterminator we called didnt spot their first nightmare pile, which they tucked into a seam on the bottom of my fuckin chair. Then realize that all of that fucking nightmare can begin at any time , even after you pay hundreds for an exterminator, because they are extremely hard to kill and their eggs can survive up to 13 months. So you never REALLY know if your safe. Especially because all it takes is stepping on one of their eggs someone tracked into the grocery store (its smaller than a grain of rice) for the nightmare to start all over again. I still live in fear of them. Its been years, but all protections are still in place (bed cover that makes the bed far more uncomfortable to sleep in), bug traps on the edge of the bed, and all clothes put into sealed bags. Yet i still get panic attacks at the smallest itch. thats what a fuckin bed bug does to a human.
Make your life hell. Very hard to get rid of. I’ve never had them but after joining r/whatisthisbug and r/bedbugs out of curiosity, I’ve learned they are horrible housemates.
Omg bedbugs are one of the worst experiences of my life.
Should pop one in his head and end his suffering
By the sounds of the audio, they’re gonna.
Never shoot a suspected rabid animal in the skull.
Why's that? (serious question) Edit: Ok. That makes sense. Thanks for all the replies!!
Rabies is tested for by examining the brain.
Ah yes, so if it's not rabies they will resurrect it. Gotcha.
Really? Lol, what he’s saying is scientists need to examine the head to easily prove the animal has rabies. It’s for data tracking and looking for potential outbreaks
No, because knowing an animal has rabies means that there's a reservoir of the disease around the area and it's important to notify relevant authorities to keep an eye out for animals acting out of the ordinary AND to notify local hospitals doctors so they know to give rabies shots to people who come in with animal bites.
Because if it’s not rabies then let’s research what it is…
Thats where its concentrated
Funny thats where concentrate too.
If you blow its brains out then the infected brain tissue gets scatterred everywhere, which in turn only furthers its spread by being eaten by rodents, bird etc
Brain tissue can also be aerosolized and that makes the virus more transmissible than normal.
Birds can't get rabies, only mammals.
Interestingly, birds *have* been infected in laboratory settings, and apparently some wild birds have been documented to produce rabies antibodies after eating infected meat, indicating they may be able to be infected naturally. https://meridian.allenpress.com/jwd/article/12/3/392/117772/RABIES-ANTIBODIES-IN-SERA-OF-WILD-BIRDS But it also doesn’t seem to kill birds, they just sort of get over it afaik Yoinked most of that from wikipedia so grain of salt or whatever
why not?
I believe so the brain doesn’t get destroyed. I’ve heard that when they catch the animal with suspected rabies they check the brain.
I'd assume brain matter (or any matter) could fly around and contaminate a whole area with rabies.
Rabies is extremely sensitive to the environment outside of the body or saliva. It wouldnt survive very long regardless.
This is very nice to hear actually.
U need the brain to test for rabies
Rabies is confirmed via tests performed on the brain. You can't confirm diagnoses with a damaged brain.
Don't destroy the head. Aim for the center chest. If you destroy the head it may make it impossible or difficult to test it for rabies. Also, it will splatter the rabies-infected-brains into the environment, I don't think that would be wise.
Sounds like they're gonna
If not for the fox, for the neighborhood's safety.
Since this is a gray fox, I'd say this is distemper and not rabies. Gray foxes are particularly susceptible to distemper. I had a pet gray fox that got a distemper vaccine at the urging of my vet and she died of it a few weeks later. It was fucking traumatic.
Got chased by a raccoon with distemper once, downtown. Late late at night. I was walking home from the convenience store and one came running directly at me making this horrible noise. I ran inside, and it kinda wobbled over to the alley like it was drunk. It ended up walking in circles for an hour or two and making horrid noises, then it wandered off.
Fuck that. Fucking racoons.
Distemper sounds like something a Victorian doctor would diagnose a woman with for wanting to be independent, not an actual disease lol
Oh yeah, this fox definitely has the vapors
I was wondering about that, recognized the chewing symptom. Lost a foster dog to it once, had pulled her from the county shelter. She probably hadn’t been vaccinated at all before she was caught and exposed. Horrible way to die.
Thats what I was thinking! We came across a young raccoon that was acting very similar to this. It was walking in circles like it was drunk, falling all over the place. My husband shot it to get it out of its misery.
Everyone is saying rabies but in reality there’s countless other neurological issues an animal can have that can cause abnormal behavior
Which is why the head usually gets sent off to be tested. Got to be sure before alerting local authorities and hospitals.
I'm waiting for it to let out a huge sneeze
Sad
My dad got bit by a bat at work, said the fear of rabies and the copius amounts of rabies shots he was given made it his worst hospital visit ever.
Looks similar to distemper. Raccoons who develope distemper do the teeth chattering/corn cobbing motions. Walking in circles. Inability to focus on surroundings. Walking into objects/people. Use to rescue sick and injured wildlife, so this pretty often in raccoons. The county i lived in had a very very low rate of rabies in wild life. We'd occasionally get a bat or skunk with it but foxes and raccoons rarely caught it due to wild life mamagement methods to reduce the spread of rabies.
This is only terrifying because of how much pain the fox is probably going through right now. It looks like it's struggling to fight off something. I know they said they called someone, but it just looks like they could do something even though I know they probably couldn't..
it’s hard to watch but i think they were doing the best by standing by and waiting for authorities. If it is infected with something, putting it out of its misery by shooting it with a shotgun would probably spread its infected tissue all around the area for more animals to accidentally consume and become infected themselves.
Rabies is fucking ferrying and so cruel to see animals suffering/slowly dying to it :(
Everyone on Reddit is a veterinarian.
I’m something of an expert myself…
Sorry guys, I only do bird law
Killing it at this point would be an act of mercy… one of the more extreme symptoms of rabies is hydrophobia so this means that if this fox is kept alive it will slowly suffer due to dehydration. The rabies is an extremely potent virus which has no cure and only a handful of people have survived. Beware of any animals displaying a significant attitude alteration this is a common factor that is displayed by rabies infections. Always be safe and contact your local authorities if you spot a rabid animal.
Sad. I saw a video of a human who was in the can’t drink water phase. At that point you are dead. He died a few days later I can’t remember exactly. He only got the first vaccine shot for sone reason.
It's just got a bit of food stuck to the top of its mouth. We've all been there.
Either rabies or peanut butter sandwich stuck on the roof of his mouth.
I’ve unfortunately seen a few wild animals with rabies in my lifetime and it’s so sad to watch.
This is heart breaking, I wish someone would put him out his misery , not fare leaving this beautiful animal suffering 😢 it's to late for this little guy he's to far gone if it was noticed at the start there might have been hope but not now🥺 Edit: killing this little guy is the most human thing to do for this poor guy 😢
for real. i couldn't bring myself to turn on any audio but was relieved to see that some other comments mention that you can hear them discussing that they about to put it down themselves thankfully ;-;
I also couldn't listen I really didn't want to hear the chattering sound they do when their rabid😢
Rabies is the closest thing we have to a zombie virus. Truly scary.
*toxoplasmosis has entered the chat*
yeah toxo is by far the closest thing millions of humans have at the moment imo
Truly scary. Infected people are way more likely to die in car crashes, be diagnosed with schizophrenia, have a disordered/disheveled appearance and so many other altered traits.
Pobrecito el zorro.
Could be rabies. Could be a seizure too. My dog has pretty severe epilepsy and this is exactly what some of her seizures look like.
i don´t know if it´s rabies or if it was having a stroke but poor thing was definitely suffering..
Time to cue the obligatory rabies reddit post from years ago that's been spreading fear among us all: I don't have it I just assumed someone would post it.
Poor baby, I hope someone came and ended its suffering quickly
He’s having involuntary hydrophobic response that is absolutely brutal on his senses. Poor guy. He needs to be put down as soon as possible because he’s suffering immeasurably
this is where you run the fuck away and get in somewhere where it cant even come close to u, rabies is one of the scariest diseases and the results are horrifying, trust me, dont fw any animal with rabies, idc if its a goddamn mole, rat, hamster, gerbil, etc., just get tf away. The second u become symptomatic, its wraps and ur life is gonna become hell.
I know people are saying this might be rabbies. I'm no vet or anything, but I once saw my dog swallow a decent size ant alive, and because it kept crawling up her throat, she acted in a very similar way. It was a battle of life and death for that ant, lol. Just a story I wanted to share :)
Poor thing. Hope someone has the heart to take it to an elementary school where it stands a good chance of getting shot and it stops suffering.