KARACHI: A woman bitten by a dog more than a month ago in the city has reported with rabies at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), raising the total number of rabies cases so far at the hospital to six and 15 in the province.

Sources said the 28-year-old patient, a resident of the Ajmer Nagri area, was brought to the JPMC on July 10.

“She hadn’t received any vaccine for the injury and presented to us with classic rabies’ symptoms, including hydrophobia. No other disease causes hydrophobia except rabies,” said Dr Irfan Siddiqui, heading the JPMC’s emergency department.

Dr Siddiqui added that patients with the deadly brain infection also developed irritation from sound and light. “We shift such patients to a quiet room and provide them with symptomatic care. Often, attendants, after being counselled and informed that the patient won’t survive, decide to take them away. The same happened in this case,” he said.

According to experts, a significant number of rabies cases go unreported as patients use home remedies or turn to faith healers for “treatment”.

They emphasised the need for public awareness, humane control of the dog population, and availability of appropriate treatment in hospitals.

While dog bites account for the majority of rabies cases, bites from potentially rabid wild animals can also transmit the virus.

After exposure, early wound cleansing, timely rabies vaccination and the administration of rabies immunoglobulin, if nee­ded, can effectively prevent the disease, which is almost invariably fatal once clinical symptoms appear.

Published in Dawn, July 12th, 2026