Teenage girl fights for her life after encounter with bat at church

Published: 2004-11-01

FOND DU LAC, Wis. (CNS) -- The Fond du Lac Catholic community has been rallying in prayer for Jeanna Giese, a 15-year-old St. Mary's Springs High School student battling rabies in a Milwaukee hospital. Either a minor bite or superficial scratch from a bat Giese encountered after a Sunday Mass in mid-September has left her fighting for her life after she was diagnosed with a rare case of human rabies Oct. 19. According to information posted Nov. 1 on the Web site www.jeannagiese.com, Giese is in stable condition but is in a coma. The teen and her family attended the 10 a.m. Mass Sept. 12 at St. Patrick Church, one of six worship sites for Fond du Lac's Holy Family Catholic Community. After Mass, she saw a bat lying on the floor of the church, carefully picked it up by its wings and released it outdoors. "We're not sure exactly what happened. Apparently, if she was bitten, it didn't break the skin," said Father Pat Heppe, who is Holy Family's priest moderator. Transmission may have occurred simply through saliva present on the bat's wing that touched an open cuticle on Giese's finger, he told the Catholic Herald, newspaper of the Milwaukee Archdiocese.

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