Slashdot Mirror
15-Year-Old Girl Survives Rabies Infection
An anonymous reader writes "A 15 y.o. girl in Wisconsin is the first known survivor of a rabies infection who did not receive the vaccine. She was placed into an induced coma while doctors gave her a cocktail of drugs to help her immune system fight the infection. (For those of us who don't realize this, rabies is considered 100% fatal once symptoms appear)."
It would be interesting to know a little more about the treatment. If they were using anti-virals, or something that affects the nervous system.
Viruses that I know infect the nerves: Polio, rabies, chickenpox (herpes zoster / shingles), herpes simplex.
There are vaccines for all but the last. Good anti-viral treatments, or anti-virals coctails that work well with nerve viruses might help with h. simplex, or h. zoster outbreaks.
"Well it's not Victory - but then it's not Death either."
Its news for medical/scientific nerds. I find it intereasting, because everyone else who goes untreated has died, so this is definantly some important, or at least semi interesting news.
"Prayer is the act by which the will of the Father and the will of the child are brought into correspondence with each other. The object of prayer is not to change the will of God, but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is already willing to grant, but that are made conditional on our asking for them. Blessings require some work or effort on our part before we can obtain them. Prayer is a form of work, and is an appointed means for obtaining the highest of all blessings."
-Bruce R. McConkie
link
Ignoring the whole "does $deity exist?" question, there are still several benefits of faith.
One of which is longer, healthier lives, with less illness and healthier immune systems.
Roll your eyes all you want, but studies have shown that in addition to many other benefits, faith tends to reduce stress, which benefits human health. In the girl's case, it was luck that she survived -- but luck favors those who were prepared. It sounds as though she had a strong, supportive family, and her religious background could have given her an outlet for stress.
In her family's case, their faith probably helped them to stay together and offload some of their stress, as well as gave them a chance to feel productive. While in a pure empirical sense, it is doubtful that this would have helped their daughter, at the very least, it helped keep their own health up. And who knows what a person in a coma senses? Perhaps the daughter picked up on their voices, their touch, or even their smell and processed it.
Its popular to believe that religion is an inane institution with no benefits what-so-ever. Considering how widespread religious belief systems are, and how long they have been imbedded in human society, it would be foolish to discredit the possibility that they no survival value.
Just my $.02
Isn't calling the argument a cop out a cop out itself? You can't reasonably argue with it one way or the other. You're just affronted by it, because it assumes that you are less than what God is, which is essentially true.
You can't back up faith with science or reason, nor can you deny it with science or reason.
And no. There is no secret code. God is also not evil, because being evil is defined in God's eyes as denying God. Prayer also does effect much, but it is usually answered in a way that you don't think or want it to be answered.
You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button.