The Incurable Wound Summary and Analysis

In 1951, a Texas woman was admitted to a hospital in Dallas, with possible diagnoses of flu, polio or encephalitis. Her symptoms were severe - some paralysis, extremely high fever, delirium, and inability to swallow. Within a few days, she was dead, an autopsy was ordered, and the disease was determined to be rabies. The doctor was surprised to learn from the husband that the only bite she had received was from a bat. At the time, scientists were very clear that the only bat carrying rabies, the Vampire, was in tropical Latin America. It was surmised that she had been bitten by a cat or dog as well, but had failed to inform her husband. There were subsequent incidents, in Florida and Pennsylvania, however, which changed researchers' minds. Clearly, rabies had come to North American bats.

Rabies...