US EditionTwo Deaths Linked to Rabies-Infected Kidney Transplant
The CDC confirmed infection from a donor kidney after a skunk scratch went unrecognized, prompting post-exposure prophylaxis for 46 contacts including healthcare workers and cornea recipients.
- On Dec. 8, 2025, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed a Michigan kidney transplant recipient died weeks after surgery, linked to the donor kidney in a rare rabies case causing two deaths.
- Because rabies testing on donor organs is not routine, the Idaho man's skunk scratch in late October went unrecognized until early December, delaying transplant teams.
- About five weeks after the transplant, the Michigan kidney recipient developed tremors, weakness, confusion, urinary incontinence, fever, and hydrophobia, while CDC laboratory testing detected rabies virus RNA in recipient samples and the donor's remaining kidney with a bat-linked rabies strain.
- Public health officials assessed 357 possible contacts and 46 people, including cornea recipients, were advised to receive PEP; doctors removed transplanted corneas after one tested positive.
- The CDC advises transplant teams to exercise greater caution when donors have animal exposures, noting rabies testing is not routine due to fewer than 10 human rabies deaths annually and over 3,500 animals testing positive yearly amid 2024 U.S. transplant volume of 48,149 from 24,018 donors.
23 Articles
23 Articles
US Man Dies From Rabies After Receiving Infected Kidney
A recipient of a kidney transplant presented a medical mystery when he died from rabies in January 2025 only weeks after his surgery in an Ohio hospital, despite having had no documented contact with the disease. A close investigation by the CDC revealed the cause: The Michigan man's donor kidney was infected by the deadly virus – only the fourth time rabies has been transmitted via transplanted organs in the US since 1978. The case, the CDC say…
Man Dies After Saving Kitten From Skunk – And Passes Rabies To Kidney Recipient
Tragic Rabies Transmission: From Skunk Scratch to Organ Transplant Fatality In an extraordinarily rare medical incident, a Michigan man died in January 2025 from rabies contracted through a kidney transplant from an Idaho donor who had unknowingly carried the virus. The donor, an unidentified man, had been scratched by a rabid skunk weeks earlier while ... Read more The post Man dies after saving kitten from skunk – and passes rabies to kidney r…
A Michigan resident died in January 2025 after contracting rabies following a kidney transplant in December 2024 at an Ohio hospital. Man dies of rabies from infected kidney. A public health investigation, confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) rabies laboratory, determined that the infection originated in the transplanted organ. According to authorities, the donor had been exposed to a wild animal in Idaho weeks earli…
An American Man Received a New Kidney, and Then Something Happened that Had Not Happened in 47 Years
American epidemiologists have shed light on why a Michigan man died five weeks after receiving a new kidney.
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