A Wisconsin woman who made history by becoming the first person in the world to survive rabies without a vaccine says it’s “surreal” that it’s still around today.
This year marked 20 years since Jeanna Giese was bitten by a bat while carrying it out of her local church in Wisconsin, USA, where it had flown in and disrupted a service.
There was no blood and the wound on his left index finger was so small that it was barely visible, so he didn’t think much of it.
But three weeks later, the 15-year-old became so tired she couldn’t get out of bed and began vomiting and seeing double.
Doctors diagnosed her with rabies, a disease with a 99 percent mortality rate, and said the schoolgirl only had a few days left because she had missed the 72-hour period for the vaccine to be administered.
Jeanna Giese was 15 years old when she was bitten by a rabid bat in church. She said her bite was microscopic but, within three weeks, it caused double vision and she ended up in an induced coma in hospital.
Ms. Giese survived after doctors tried something on her that had never been tried before. In 2014, ten years after the 2004 bite, she married Scot Frassetto.
The couple first had twins, Carly and Connor, and then a baby boy named Tristan.
But then their doctor suggested they try something that had never been done before to treat the virus.
Ms Giese was put in a coma for two weeks to give her immune system time to fight off the rabies, which, miraculously, worked.
After spending two years in recovery, where she learned to walk and talk again, Ms. Giese married and became a mother of three children.
Revealing his life after infection in 2004, he said CBS7: ‘It’s almost surreal to think, you know, 20 years. My life changed completely when I got sick.’
About 60,000 Americans are bitten by potentially rabid animals each year, which is considered a death sentence if someone does not receive the vaccine within 72 hours.
Rabies is almost always fatal because it spreads to the brain where it causes inflammation that destroys brain cells.
But in Giese’s case, this was exactly the cycle doctors tried to break.
She was placed in an induced coma to suppress brain activity and prevent this deadly buildup of inflammation.
Now known as the ‘Milwaukee Method’, it has since been used to save at least two other patients, including then eight-year-old Precious Reynolds, who was scratched by a rabies-infected stray cat in 2011.
On the day that changed his life, Giese went to church to pick up a bat that had been flying during the service before being crushed.
However, as the animal lover was taking him outside, the animal approached and sank its fangs into the third index finger of his left hand.
There was some blood and “it hurt a lot,” Giese said, but once they cleaned the wound the mark was practically microscopic.
Mrs Giese was in an induced coma for two weeks, but when she returned she was “like a baby” and had to spend two years relearning how to walk, talk and care for herself.
She is pictured above in a wheelchair during her recovery process at her home in Wisconsin.
Ms Giese said doctors had warned her that when she started treatment there was a risk she would end up “like a vegetable”.
His mother cleaned the wound with hydrogen peroxide, an antiseptic, and then the family moved on with their lives.
But three weeks later, Giese suddenly became so tired that he couldn’t get out of bed, had double vision, and began vomiting regularly.
Her parents rushed her to a nearby hospital, where doctors tested her for a variety of illnesses, including meningitis and Lyme disease, but all came back negative.
She was then taken to Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, where doctors “turned white” when her parents said she had been bitten by a bat about a month ago. Samples were sent to the CDC for testing, which quickly revealed that she had rabies.
Dr. Rodney Willoughby, a pediatric doctor at the hospital who specializes in infectious diseases, said, “Well, I thought I was going to die.”
‘That’s what everyone did, as far as my knowledge of rabies went at the time was that there wasn’t much to do. It’s really 100 percent fatal.”
That’s when Dr. Willoughby suggested trying something that had never been tried before, and the parents said yes, eager to save their daughter.
She was in a coma for 14 days and when she woke up the virus was gone but she was like a ‘newborn baby’ and had to relearn everything.
Mrs Giese added: “I was basically a newborn baby when I was 15. I couldn’t do anything.
‘The road to recovery was very long and painful. (But) I didn’t quit. I guess it’s personal stubbornness.
Currently Mrs. Giese also works at the Children’s Museum (pictured). She reveals her story to raise awareness about rabies treatments among those who have not received a vaccine.
Giese revealed his story again 20 years after his first brush with the disease
Dr Rodney Willoughby, pictured, suggested the experimental method of treating the disease.
Mrs. Giese was in the hospital for another nine weeks and then spent two years attending outpatient therapy. Learning to walk again took me two months.
At that time, she quickly became a global news sensation as the first person to survive rabies.
She then returned to school before graduating and, in 2014, married her husband Scot Frassetto.
The couple had twins in March 2016, named Carly and Connor, and then a baby boy in 2018, named Tristan.
Ms. Giese is now raising her family while also working at the Fond du Lac Children’s Museum in central Wisconsin.
Talking about his experience with The Guardian Late last year, he added: ‘Since then, some other people have recovered from rabies using the same method.
“Although not all cases have had the same positive result, it is incredible that there is now the possibility of surviving a disease that was previously considered fatal without vaccination.”
“I’m very happy to know that I helped pave the way for that change.”
