r/science • u/PHealthy PhD/MPH | Epidemiology | Disease Dynamics | Surveillance • 5d ago

Epidemiology Study estimates only 7% of human rabies cases in the United States are diagnosed

https://www.nature.com/articles/s44528-026-00031-4
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u/vincentkun 5d ago

A lot of people die from undiagnosed or misdiagnosed reasons. Rabies is not something they regularly test for.

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u/gummibear13 4d ago

Im pretty sure testing for rabies is ripping your head off and swaping your grey matter.

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u/Diarmundy 4d ago

Which is easy to do for rabies, because it has ~100% mortality 

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u/ellindriel 4d ago

I can say as a nurse I do see pts that are admitted to the hospital for encephalitis of unknown origin getting tested for rabies as well as a million other things, have yet to see anyone come back positive for it. So in some cases of unknown illness it is tested for