Petting Zoo Bear Rabid
Iowa health officials are trying to alert people about a rabid bear that came into contact with hundreds of people.
The bear who lived at the Swenson Wild Midwest Exotic Petting Zoo in Clermont, Iowa, showed no signs of rabies until Friday. It died later that same day. Dr. Steven Gleason, head of the Iowa Department Public Health in Des Moines, talked to CBS This Morning.
"It's possible the bear was communicable for the last 30 days prior to death," explains Dr. Gleason.
The bear was very friendly. And people found it tempting to reach out, touch the bear and get licked by it, says Dr. Gleason, who notes the bear didn't show symptoms until very late in the disease.
Not only are Iowa residents at risk, but so are people in the Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois and Missouri that may have visited the zoo in recent weeks.
On Saturday authorities learned that the bear had rabies after an autopsy was performed.
 CBS Dr. Gleason: faces challenge of spreading the word |
"The difficulty is trying to reach the people that may have come in contact with the bear," Dr. Gleason says.
Health officials have issued a statewide alert and have begun calling as many as 250 people who signed a guest book.
They were also trying to track down about 150 people who came into contact with the bear Aug. 14. Tourists from as far as Australia may be at risk.
"We had one girl who we found in Arizona that actually exchanged gum with this bear," Dr. Gleason says.
Anyone nipped by the bear or in contact with the bear's saliva could be at risk if they had open cuts or scratches or if the saliva reached their mouth or nose. Anyone who had such contact after July 30 should be examined, he says.
The rabies virus can sit dormant for months or years before symptoms emerge. But after symptoms appear, death is almost certain. Once introduced into the body, the virus multiplies at the point of entry and then travels through the nervous system to the brain.
"The early symptoms are tingling and numbness around the site of the bite. They are neurological symptoms and [the] virus travels up the nerve tracks toward the brain, where the person begins to develop encephalitis-type symptoms," Dr. Gleason explains.
"This girl who exchanged gum with the bear is at high risk," he says. But he notes she has not yet shown any symptoms.
Those who have been in contact with the bear should receive antitoxic serum, which attacks the virus at the site of the wound. It will not eliminte the disease, however.
The body must mobilize antibodies, so that's where the shots prove useful. People used to have to receive shots in the stomach that were very painful. Now administered in the shoulder, the shots are no more painful than those for flu.
Shot are given after seven days, 10 days and 14 days, and then 28 days apart.
"There is nothing to fear. Just get the shots if you have been exposed," says Dr. Gleason.
It has been 48 years since anyone died of rabies in Iowa, and nationally 24 people have died of rabies since 1981.
"The only multiple bear attack we have encountered was almost prehistoric literature in the 900s in France. It's very, very uncommon, but it's a situation that, because we don't know everybody that came to this zoo, because not everybody signed in, we need to get out the word," Dr. Gleason says.
©1999 CBS Worldwide Inc. All Rights Reserved