# Rabies: A Holiday Scratch Led to a Mother’s Death
It was just a scratch. Among all the feelings and thoughts that she has had to wrestle with since the summer, disbelief is the emotion that Robyn Thomson still struggles with the most. “You never think it would happen to you,” said Robyn. “You don’t really think it happens to anyone.”
Robyn’s mother, Yvonne Ford, had shown no signs of illness in the months after returning from her holiday in Morocco in February.She had spoken highly of the country and its people, and recommended it for future getaways. She had not realised that a seemingly harmless interaction with a puppy while sitting in the sun would cause so much damage.
The signs of Yvonne’s illness remained dormant for months until June, when she began to have flu-like symptoms.The headaches and fever that followed rapidly became more severe and the 59-year-old soon lost the ability to walk or eat.
Robyn, a trained nurse, did not know what was causing her mother’s sickness, nor did her doctors. By the time she was admitted to hospital and diagnosed with rabies, there was nothing anyone could do to save Yvonne’s life.
“It didn’t feel real,” said Robyn,recalling her disbelief that such a small mark could have brought her world crashing down. “I remember thinking it had to be something else, she hadn’t been bitten or attacked.”
When Yvonne died on 11 June, she became only the seventh person since 2000 to die in the UK from rabies, a virus transmitted through saliva that causes brain inflammation. Outside the UK, though, about 60,000 die from rabies every year, with the virus almost always proving fatal once symptoms develop. In