Trouble wears a mask: 16 who befriend baby raccoon now face rabies threat

island packet ^ | May 9, 2008 | LIZ MITCHELL

[george76]

Sixteen people who fed, kissed and held a baby raccoon on Hilton Head Island now are being treated by a physician after the animal tested positive for rabies.

There also are seven more people who might need vaccines to prevent them from contracting the disease

"Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips," .

"There was a lot of affectionate handling, kissing it and feeding it. Part of that is it was three weeks old, and they inserted fingers into the raccoon's mouth. Saliva is one way that rabies spreads."

Boatwright said the baby raccoon did not show signs of the disease, but got sick Monday and had seizures. On Tuesday, a veterinarian euthanized the animal and sent it to DHEC, where it tested positive for rabies.

In most cases, Boatwright said, wild animals will not show signs of rabies, and people will not experience symptoms if they are exposed to the disease.

"Once you have a symptom, it has reached the brain and it is fatal,"

[SIDENET]

"Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips,"

Damn, dude.

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

["Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips,"]

Kissed it on the lips? OK.

[AprilfromTexas]

note to self: don’t kiss a wild animal on the mouth

[Hazwaste]

"Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips,"

Was that wrong? Should I have not done that? I tell you I gotta plead ingnorance on this thing because if anyone had said anything to me at all when I first started here that that sort of thing was frowned upon...

[Kozak]

[george76]

Post-exposure human treatment includes a series of five shots in the shoulder or forearm, along with one shot in the buttocks and extra shots around the bite.

http://www.islandpacket.com/news/local/story/510397.html

[samtheman]

Kissing a racoon on the mouth. How Republican.

[Grizzled Bear]

"Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips,"

Why?

[kbennkc]

I have held hands with a raccoon , but that is as far as it went . We did not even have drinks .

[Fractal Trader]

Stupid is as stupid does.

At least they were lucky enough to have discovered that the raccoon actually had rabies.

[joebuck]

I remember when I was a kid the Disney movie “Rascal” (about a raccoon) came out and I (along with thousands of other kids) begged my parents for a pet raccoon. My dad then advised me that raccoons were widely known are carriers of rabies. He then told me what happens when you catch rabies. I've never gotten close to raccoon since.

[redhead]

""Someone adopted a baby raccoon and passed it around to everyone they knew and kissed it on the lips," Why?

My thoughts exactly.

[Flycatcher]

Makes you wonder what they’d do with a cute little poison dart frog.

[Publius6961]

Natural selection of the fittest. Darwinism at its best.

Might this explain the baby seals hysterics and PETA?

[Bender2]

If my old Grandpappy was around today, he'd say, “This sure is the year for troublesome coo... eh, racoons, to clean it up.

[Lady Jag]

[definitelynotaliberal]

Maybe, given their propensity to anthromorphize everything, they expected the raccoon to take their faces in its front paws and kiss them back.

[mkjessup]

Kissing a racoon on the mouth. How Republican.

Oh I don't know about that:

[happinesswithoutpeace]

what