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originally today ( Aug. 12 ) , the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported the first know guinea pig of a mortal give-up the ghost in the United States as a result of a vampire bat bite . Which raises the doubt : Are the residuum of us at risk ?
No , not really , says one expert , and for two good understanding .
Vampire bat
First of all , the person who died , a 19 - year - old from Mexico , was n’t in reality bitten in the U.S. ; he was seize with teeth in Michoacán , Mexico , and die a few weeks later during a trip to Louisiana ( this all happened last August ) . Also , he did n’t die from the bite itself , but from the rabies virus that the cricket bat infect him with .
These are fundamental distinctions , said Gerald Carter , a Ph . D. biology prospect at the University of Maryland and an expert on vampire bat behavior .
First of all – and in all probability most significantly – lamia bats do n’t live in the U.S. They exist only in Central and South America – from central Mexico down to around Brazil – where they parasitize cattle and horses , Carter pronounce . There is some research that chew over that as the climate go along to get warmer , vampire batswill reach out their range into the United States . presently , though , there is little to no cause to believe that the at-bat have already done so . [ 7 Strange Ways That Humans play Like lamia ]
" There has been one incident of a vampire squash racquet found in the United States , " Carter say . " It was n’t even the variety insure on people ; it was one of the coinage that feeds only on birds . There has never been a colony or population of vampire bat found in the United States . "
Another reason not to care is that a vampire squash racquet bite is n’t really that sorry , and they ’re comparatively rarefied .
" The commonvampire bat feeds on big animals , such as cows and cavalry . now and then people get bitten when they slumber out in the receptive or nigh cattle , " Carter said . " The sting itself is a midget little wound , often on the toe ; people often have difficulty discover the injury , and discover it only because they wake up with flaming sheets . The chiropteran takes only a tablespoonful of blood , but the injury can hemorrhage a bunch , at least for its size , because the bat ’s saliva has an anticoagulant medication in it . "
The sting itself is so minor that it wo n’t do you much harm , but Carter accentuate that , as with any animal bite , you require to get medical attention and experience a post - contact rabies inoculation . intervention for any variety of madness is usually agile and well-situated in the United States , and so only two or three people die from lyssa per yr here .
" Vampire chiropteran rabies should not be considered a public health job in the United States , but it is an of import business organisation for Romance American countries , " Carter enunciate . This is mostly because of limited access to hydrophobia vaccinations after one suffers a bite . Still , even in those country , these are isolated incidents that occur just a few times a year .
" Statistically in the United States , this is not a public health issue at all , " Carter say . " In Latin America , it ’s almost more of a stunning matter , where a few people a twelvemonth is considered an ' irruption . ' It ’s not a tacit epidemic , because it always gets a portion of press . "
President Carter lament that story of vampire bats occur rabies to the great unwashed evoke up much anti - bat opinion ; mass often defeat bats over these fears . Many more people die from diseases carried by worm , Carter noted . Ironically , squash racket are prize marauder of those louse .
