Is there a record of a rabid human attacking another human?

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Accepted answer

Using the historic term for rabies, hydrophobia, and searching 19th century documents, records of infected patients biting caregivers can be found quite readily. The 1879 edition of The Dublin Journal of Medical Science has an article, the Report on Hydrophobia, which mentions several occasions, none of which resulted in infection of those bitten.

Among other cases to which he alludes is that of M. Caillard resident physician of the Hôtel Dieu, who was bitten, in 1814 by a hydrophobic man whom he, unaided, courageously succeeded in securing after all the attendants had fled. In 1831 he was a second bitten, while taking a piece of cloth from the back of the pharynx a child labouring under hydrophobia.

A woman, aged seventeen, who ultimately died of the disease, bit a surgeon who brought her out of the street whither she had fled, yet no bad consequences resulted.

The propensity to bite on the part of hydrophobics some times exposes their attendants to certain risks, and tends materially to unnerve them. Dr Copland speaks of the case of a boy, aged twelve, who while sitting on his mother's knee, suddenly forward at Dr C. with an involuntary impulse which required his mother's strength to restrain, although he had expressed great attachment to Dr C and a desire of seeing him frequently. As soon as the paroxysm had subsided, he excused himself, and that his conduct arose from a violent impulse and a feeling as if could tear in pieces whatever came in his way. He died six hours afterwards.

The conclusion listed is similar to what is mentioned in the above-cited wiki article:

Bollinger considers that it is doubtful whether any reliable cases are known in which human beings suffering from hydrophobia have communicated the disease by their bite although in view of the successful attempts at retro inoculation from men to animals the possibility of that mode of infection cannot be denied. Dr Shinkwin comes to the conclusion that all the cases on record go to prove that hydrophobia is not communicable from man to man.

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