Doctors Discover Organ Donor Had Raccoon Rabies

A North Carolina Air Force recruit who donated his organs tofour patients turned out to have rabies. The recipient of the man’s kidney died in February and lab testingconfirmed rabies in the donor’s brain tissue and encephalitis, a braininflammation brought on by rabies.

The other three recipients who received the donor’s heart,liver, and other kidney are considered at risk, but remain well after receivinganti-rabies treatment.

The donor, 20-year-old William Edward Small, “had at leasttwo untreated raccoon bites several months before he became sick.”  Although there are only about two humanrabies deaths in the U.S. each year, this case illustrates the need to improvescreening of organ donors for suspected encephalitis.

See Organs From Man With Rabies TransplantedInto Four People, Fox News, July 24, 2013.