Thought beaten, rabies kills 2 children in Malaysia
Print Edition
TWO Malaysian children have died after contracting rabies, the country’s first such deaths in almost two decades, as authorities battle a rare outbreak of the disease, officials said yesterday.
A 6-year-old girl and her 4-year-old brother died Tuesday after becoming infected with the disease in a rural area on the Malaysian part of Borneo island.
They were among three people confirmed to have been infected with rabies, which in most cases is transmitted via dog bites, according to Sarawak state’s local government and housing minister, Sim Kui Hian.
“Two of the three confirmed cases ... were pronounced dead,” he said. “They were diagnosed to be brain dead and the parents have agreed for the life support to be withdrawn.”
He said the other patient was still “critically ill.”
Noor Hisham Abdullah, Malaysia’s director general of health, said that the cases were the first rabies-related deaths in the country in almost 20 years.
Five villages in the Serian district of Sarawak state, which borders the Indonesian part of Borneo, are confirmed as having been affected by the outbreak. Enormous, jungle-clad Borneo is shared between Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei.
Sim said health teams in Serian had visited 19 villages as of Tuesday and carried out checks on over 6,000 people. Only three cases of humans contracting rabies have so far been confirmed. Officials have ordered all dogs in the area to be vaccinated against rabies, state news agency Bernama said.
Rabies causes inflammation of the brain and spinal cord, and is almost always fatal once contracted, according to the World Health Organization.
It mainly affects poor and vulnerable populations in rural areas.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
